


You Can Make It Perfect Or We Can Compromise

by periwren



Category: Real Person Fiction, Sander sides web series, Sanders Sides, Thomas Sanders, Video Blogging RPF, youtube - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Anxiety | Virgil Sanders - Freeform, Candy, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Tree, Cold Weather, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders - Freeform, Deceit Sanders makes an appearance, Finally, Finally finished, Little bit of blood, Logic gets emotional, Logic | Logan Sanders - Freeform, Mistletoe, Morality gets mad, Morality | Patton Sanders - Freeform, Pneumonia, Princey gets whats coming to him, Selfish Princey, Sick Anxiety, Spirit of Christmas - Freeform, Virgil gets hospital visitors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-02
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2018-11-22 07:29:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 28,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11375475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/periwren/pseuds/periwren
Summary: Its that wonderful time of year - Time to set up the Christmas tree and all the decorations in the Sanders household. But like any other task things can never go smoothly. Princey wants it to be perfect (meaning he has to be in charge and/or do it himself), Logic want's it be organized, Morality wants it to be fun and amazing (and can't wait for the Early Elves to leave their treats) and Anxiety ... wishes they would let him join in and help for once.





	1. Needs to be Pretty

It was that wonderful time of year again, the start of the holidays and all through the house there were boxes and boxes overflowing with decorations, wrappings and lights. Every year when the sides managed to get everything finished Thomas's house always looked fantastic and festive. But every year they always seemed to forget that for the several hours that it took for them to get everything out of storage, unpacked, dusted off, stop Patton from playing with the decorations like toys, decide where everything was going to go this year, and then getting stuck into actually putting up the decorations; really pushed the personalities (except Patton) to breaking point.

This year was no different.

Actually this year is worse, thought Anxiety, because the embodiment of Thomas's negative emotions was suffering from a dreadful cold. He really wanted this to be all over soon so he could go and lie down with a box of tissues and sooth his aching head. _But_ he couldn't leave until this was done. Not that he would ever admit it out loud but Anxiety was _trying_ this year to be a little less um spicy as Dad would say and try and get along better with the others. Anxiety had been getting along better than ever with Logic lately, even hanging out together when there was no apparent reason ~~like friends~~ and Morality was just so jazzed when Anxiety offered to help him carry the boxes and then had stayed when they started sorting out the decorations.

The only problem (apart from his blocked sinuses) was;

"HEY Rudolf! What do you think you're doing! That's not how you handle baubles your getting your grimy fingerprints all over it!"

Was Prince, as usual.

"Stop calling me Rudolf Princey, or I swear that I will shove this bauble so far up -" threatened Anxiety but it lost its fire because how stuffed up the side sounded as he said it.

"Okay kiddos lets keep it Christmassy, here Anxiety I'll take that it'll look good here," interrupted Morality as he tried to place the decoration on the tree but

"No, no, no, Morality it can't go there, that section has too many red ones already it has to go over here," cried Princey dramatically swooping in and snatching the ball from Morality's hand.

Anxiety sniffed angrily wiping his nose with the back of his hand. It was bad enough that he was sick but worse that Princey had quickly draw the comparison between Anxiety's nose and the reindeer and was intent on reminding him of this fact every chance he got, he had even taken a sneak picture of Anxiety photo shopped some antlers on him and posted it all over the internet.

Leaning over the box Anxiety picked up another brightly colored bauble and turned it about in his hands. It was a special one that Thomas had made as a child as part of a craft workshop, it was blue with a wobbly hand draw "Thomas" on it. Anxiety stepped forward to put it on the tree.

"Whoa stop, what are you doing?" Princey jumped in front of the tree and threw his arms out wide to keep Anxiety getting closer, his eyes bulging in alarm as if Anxiety was holding a blowtorch not decoration.

"Are you seriously asking me that!? What does it look like I'm doing!?"

But Princey was busy critically staring back and forth between the bauble and the tree.

"No'' he said firmly, taking the bauble and putting it back in the box, "It clashes horribly with the rest of the tree, just like you attire with the rest of the room,"

Anxiety huffed and went and sat down on his section of the stairs. He was getting fed up with this. He wanted to be apart of this, he just wanted to _help._ But Princey was determined to treat him like the bad guy, like everything he did was an act of sabotage.

Every time he made a suggestion it was shot down immediately usually accompanied by an insult "What would you know about making anything look nice"

Anything he tried to do was wrong "You don't wrap tinsel around the bannister anti-clock wise! It must go clockwise. Why must you drag everyone down with your misery?"

Anxiety pulled his knees up to his chest and folded his arms around them huddling in on himself. Morality scooted over to him as Princey moved away to argue with Logic about where the elf on the shelf had to go.

"Hey kiddo, don't take it personally, Princey just gets a little "enthusiastic" about the decorating - he is Thomas's creativtity after all," said Morality

"More like he's turned into a completely psycho control freak," muttered Anxiety. Patton gave him a small smile.

"And why the personal vendetta against me! Its not like Logic's been a blossom of enthusiasm for all of his ideas either," (Logic had actually turned up to this decorating with a ruler, a color coordination wheel and a book on fen shui), but its like if I suggest it, then its immediately considered crap," sighed Anxiety unhappily rubbing his temples with his fingers trying to sooth his aching head.

"Well, try and see the bright side, the sooner we get this up (even if Princey is bossy and does most of it) then the sooner the Early Elves will come to leave us some special treats!" squealed Patton excitedly bouncing on the spot.

Anxiety smiled as he looked at Patton with his child like wonder. Five years ago when Anxiety used to shut himself up in his room while the others decorated, he for some unknown reason had gotten extremely guilty that he never did anything to help out. So one day he bought a bag of candy canes and at night when the others had gone to bed he crept downstairs an added the canes to the branches of the tree. When Morality had found them the next day it was like Christmas had come early, he was so excited. He pestered the others and Thomas trying to find out which of them had done it. But Thomas, Princey and Logic all told him that they honestly had no idea, and Anxiety had denied that it was him.

It made Anxiety ... happy? that Patton was so excited over some stupid little candy canes that Anxiety had kept doing it every year since, his own little Christmas tradition. He wasn't sure where Morality had come up with the name Early Elves - probably something he invented himself to explain who was breaking into their house to leave them sweets. Thomas, Princey or Logic had never asked Anxiety if he was the one doing it, each of them must have just assumed that it was one of the others doing it. But they had all complimented them - saying that they were really cute idea. Princey had even once remarked that he wished he had thought of it himself.

"Alright, I think at last we have finished our task," said Logic

Morality and Anxiety got up from the stairs and walked over to the couch where Princey and Logic were standing and surveyed the room. It had taken forever but it did look good.

"Ah I have done a magnificent job once again," said Prince puffing his chest out proudly

"Ahem I do believe that it was a team effort for this venture," corrected Logic

But Princey wasn't listening, he was looking at the Christmas tree, chewing the side of his thumb.

Anxiety put his hand over his mouth as a sudden coughing fit hit him.

"Will you be quite, something's not right and I need complete concentration," snapped Princey

Anxiety glared at him and was about to make a retort, when Princey strode forward and dived into one of the boxes and cried "Aha" and placed onto the center of the Christmas tree the exact blue bauble that Anxiety had in his hand not five minutes ago.

"There now its perfect,"

"Oh don't you think it clashes horribly?" asked Anxiety sarcastically

"No," said Princey looking affronted

Anxiety rolled his eyes, "I literally tried to put that exact decoration on tree moments ago!"

"You couldn't have possibly have gotten the placement as good as I,"

"You're really full of yourself you know that-

"Guys please stop lets not fight, this is an activity to bring families together," pleaded Morality with puppy dog eyes "And the Early Elves might not come unless we've been good"

"I will not stand here and be insulted by Rudolf who hasn't lifted a finger the entire night to help!" said Princey

"Wh-WHAT," spluttered Anxiety, his temper flared which did nothing to help his throbbing head ache, "YOU have done nothing but stop me from doing _anything_ at all for the entire evening. I-I just wanted to join you in all this pointless festive junk, but you have just been acting like a stuck up jerk - we have to all follow your suggestions, we all have to do things your way, we have to do what you want - and then the _one_ decoration I tried to put on the tree, if I did it, it would have ruined everything but when you did it, it looks fabulous."

"Well I am the creative persona - of course I need to be in charge, its Christmas decorating! Someone like you couldn't possibly understand how important this is. I am the only one who can make this look perfect. God, who knows what it would look like if you ran about unchecked - "ruined" would be a grand understatement. I am just trying to protect the festive season from you. Honestly Anxiety you couldn't think of a single nice Christmassy Idea if your life depended on it!" shouted Princey

"That's not true," Anxiety shouted back

"Prove it!"

"I'M the one whose putting those stupid candy canes on the tree! Not some fake Early Elves!" snapped Anxiety as he stepped out into the middle of the room and spread out his arms "But don't worry you don't have to "protect" any of this fake, plastic, money grabbing merchandise from me anymore - I'm so out of here, I hope you enjoy it Princey its just like you - pretty to look at and that's it,"

Everyone was frozen in shock from this outburst that they didn't make any attempts to stop Anxiety as he stormed out the front door into the night.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Christmas in July anybody.  
> 


	2. Separated

Anxiety ran away from the house and down the streets taking turns at random not caring or paying attention to which way he was going. Soon he slowed to jog (he didn't go outside that often so he couldn't keep up the pace of running for long), trying to steady his breathing. He glanced back over his shoulder to see if the others were following him.

They weren't. Of course they fucking weren't, he thought angrily, why hell would they? What did he expect? They may have tolerated him just sulking in the corner but now, after he shouted about their activity being pointless and fake, of course they wouldn't coming after him. Putting up all that shiny, plastic crap was important to them, they were probably relived that he finally had left them alone.

He jammed his hands into the pockets of his hoodie because the night air was so bitterly cold and coughed hard, his chest aching from the sudden and unnecessary exercise.

Stupid decorations, stupid tree, _stupid Princey_

He coughed again and this time brought up a clump of phlegm. Anxiety spat it out into some random flower bushes and kept walking. It was dark but there was enough light to see by, there were still street lights, some of the houses lights on through their windows (some yards even had their Christmas lights up) and there were cars going by with their headlights on.

Probably people heading home from a crappy 9-5 office job where they do the same thing day in day out everyday and will continue to do so until one day they finally retire but then they will be so old they are almost dead and everything they spent their lives working for (if they even have anything to show for it at all) will be all meaningless anyway, thought Anxiety. He stopped at a corner and waited for a car with a middle aged man in it drive by before crossing the street.

But I bet they go to that crappy job everyday because they come home to a family that wants them to hang around.

* * *

 

"ANXIETY! ANXIETY! ANNNXIETY!!!"

"Patton please! The neighbors will make a noise complaint,"

"But, but"

"Either he's not there or he's camouflaged in the shadows ignoring you but delighted to hear you screeching his name into the night like an attention seeking brat!"

"Princey he wouldn't do that,"

"Then clearly _he's not there,_ so stop yelling out his name!"

Patton wrung his hands nervously "We - we need to find him though, oh Logic why did you stop me from going after him?"

"Morality, Anxiety was clearly upset at the situation and doesn't deal with social interaction very well, perhaps even less so than me, the best thing to give him some space to let him calm down. He will come back when he's ready."

"Oh please Logic don't tell me you bought that load of utter nonsense. Morality I can understand, he's so trusting that he always falls for that vile fiend's ploys to manipulate the situation to gain unfounded sympathy. Let me point out the obvious to both of you. Anxiety chucked his little hissy fit just when we finished. So now the fun parts over and guess which three sides are left to do the packing up,"

Princey leaned over to the nearest box and started putting the excess decorations in it. "It's the reverse Little Red Hen scenario, Mr Doom and Gloom will literally walk back through that door the second we finish this,"

Logic walks over to Morality and guides him away from the front door back into the room, "Come on Patton lets pack these up, it will do you good to be doing something instead of standing by the door worrying,"

As Patton drops on his knees to gather the extra tinsel he keeps glancing uncertainly towards the door "I don't think Anxiety had any fun putting up the decorations," and then said quietly "I don't think I did either,"

Princey pretended not to hear.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope I made the right reference with Henny Penny - the Hen that grows the seeds, harvests the wheat, grinds the grain and bakes the flour to make the bread - and then everyone wants to eat it without doing any of the work.  
> ** Now changed to The Little Red Hen - the correct Hen for the comparison**


	3. Night

It was getting really cold - Anxiety zipped up the front of his hoodie to stop the wind hitting his chest

He kept walking.

He pulled out a tissue and blew his nose into it.

His headache was getting worse, he wished he could just curl up in bed and rest.

He kept walking.

Maybe he should go back, Dad would be worried (maybe?). No, no he wouldn't. I just blurted out that Early Elves aren't real, oh god he's probably heartbroken. I ruined that for him. I ruin everything.

He kept walking.

He started coughing heavily again and covered his mouth. Why he thought, its not like there's anyone out here that you could get sick. Knowing you, you have probably already given your cold to the others - of course ruin the decorating and get the others sick while doing it - bravo.

He kept walking.

 

~~~~~~

Anxiety wasn't back by the time they finished packing up the boxes of decorations.

Princey turned on the TV and Morality made them all cups of hot chocolate. They drank quietly but Morality kept looking at the door.

Logic and Princey discussed plans they had made about the sides going to the shops the next day to make a start on gift shopping.

Anxiety hadn't come back yet.

Princey left soon after to go to bed, he always went to bed first - a good nights sleep was needed to maintain beauty.

Anxiety still wasn't back yet.

Logic stayed in the living room with Morality, jotting down a list of people and possible things they might like for the shopping trip tomorrow, "I'm sure he'll be back soon" he said quietly. Patton nodded nervously.

 

~~~~

Cold.

So damn cold.

He used up all the tissues now and was sniffing and wiping his nose on the back of his sleeve.

Still walking.

He doesn't know where he is now. Does it matter? Nobody cares.

He kept walking.

It's cold.

 

~~~~

It was late, very late.

He should be back by now, thought Logic looking at an anxious Patton chewing his fingernails.

Was he lost? It was dark and he didn't go out very often - Yes lost was a distinct possibility.

"We should call him,"

"Yes of course, oh you're so smart!" Patton pulled out his phone and dialed. The house was quite so they could hear the ring tone go off upstairs.

"He's back!" Patton runs up stairs. That-That's not possible, thought Logic, they only have the power to go from their rooms, to places like the living room or mind space. Anxiety could not go from outside into his room.

Patton came back down stairs, holding in his open palms a phone looking at it with a crushed and anguished expression, like a small child holding their favorite toy that's been broken " Logic he doesn't have his phone"

~~~~

 He was so cold he was shivering now.

He was still walking but he was tired, he wanted to stop.

Should he call the others? Oh sure like they want to be woken up in the middle of the night and dragged out of bed to come and get _you._ They would probably tell him to go die in a gutter.

His legs hurt, his chest really hurt, his head felt like someone had hit it with an axe.

How long had he been walking? What time was it?

He reached for his phone, all he could feel was the used tissues, his phone wasn't there. He remembered he put it on charge in his room, he deliberately put it away so he wouldn't be tempted to pull it out and use it during the decorating, so there would be no "distractions" that he could use as an excuse to stop him from "joining in".

He had no phone, he didn't know where he was, it was dark - only the street lights were on now, the house lights were off people were asleep.

Another coughing fit hit him.

He stopped walking.

Shit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know how to make the note about "does it snow" stop appearing at the bottom of each chapter :P


	4. Need to find him

Logic grabbed Patton as he rushed for the door.

"Stop," he said firmly "We need to calm down and not act rashly based on your emotions,"

"But-"

"Firstly put your cardigan on, it is going to be cold outside and the last thing we need is the two of us experiencing a decreased body temperature, it will impede our efficiency to find Anxiety."

Morality gasped, "Oh my god Logic, Anxiety must be freezing he's been out there for hours, and he's sick and-"

"Anxiety's thick hoodie will have provided him with some insulation," insisted Logic trying to offer reassurance to Morality, although he knew the jacket would only offer so much warmth.

"Secondly we cannot leave this household without alerting Roman as to where we are going-"

"Yes that's right, Roman's a hero, he will definitely help us on our quest to drive around and find Anxiety, he'll know what we need to do, he's an expert at rescue missions!"

"Well I don't know about that-"

But Morality was already running up the stairs towards Princey's Room.

~~~~~~

 

Anxiety stood underneath the street light watching his breath rise up in a fine mist, shivering and trying not to panic. He was failing miserably.

What should I do? What should I do? What should I do? Do I try and back track? I have no idea which ways I turned going down all those streets. Why does everything look so different in the dark? Should I stay here? What just wait here until morning- are you crazy? What was that noise? Is there something in those shadows? There's definitely something in those shadows. There's something in the shadows and it's going to get me. Standing in the street light makes me a target everything can see me. There's nothing out there watching you stop being paranoid. God it's so cold. Think. Think dammit. What would Morality, Logic and ~~Princey~~ do? Okay um, Morality always says that I should talk to others about my problems. I-I could go to one of those houses and tell them I'm lost and ask to use their phone to call the others. That could work. Did something just move over there? I can't bang on some random person's door at this hour - they're  gonna take one look at me and think I'm a burglar, or some high addict or both. They would call the cops. Or shoot me. Or call the cops and then the cops would shoot me. OH MY GOD WHAT IS THAT IT'S GOING TO KILL ME HELP HELP HELP I DONT WANT TO DIE YOUNG EVEN IF I LEAVE A BEAUITFUL CORPSE - oh it's just a cat. Stupid cat.  I'm not crying. I'm not. It's just so cold its stinging my eyes and I don't know what to do and I want to go home and it's cold and even that stupid cat has left me.

 

~~~~~~

Princey was dreaming. Of all the beautiful things that make the holidays specials. Glamorous shinny decorations.  Fantastic sweet rich foods.  Spontaneous caroling. Drawing handmade cards.  Watching Christmas movies and TV specials. Bright Christmassy outfits. Presents. Shopping. Posting it all on Instagram. More spontaneous caroling. Thomas's creative side loved the holidays.

A rescue mission. Huh that wasn't part of the holidays.

"No we need to go on a rescue mission!" said Morality.

As Princey's dreams dissolved around him, he found himself squinting in the dark at Morality, trying to gather his thoughts, "What?"

"A rescue mission," repeated Morality as if this explained everything.

"Roman, Anxiety has still not returned," explained Logic.

Princey groaned,he was still half asleep, seriously Anxiety had not only ruined decorating but was now interrupting his beauty sleep?!?

"Patton and I are planning to drive around to search for him and bring him home"

"And why did you need to tell me this?" Princey asked groggily

Morality looked confused, he expected more of a dramatic reaction from Prince - maybe he leaping from his bed sword in hand, shouting that there was a damsel to save, even though Anxiety wasn't a damsel but still. Logic hesitated as well, he wasn't sure what he was excepting but figured since Princey had not offered to come with them on this venture, forcefully dragging him from the bed would not be the best course of action, no right now the best course of action now would be;

"We needed to let you know that we are leaving the house and also ask you to phone us should Anxiety return after we have gone,"

"What time is it?"

"1.32am"

Ah there's the dramatic reaction. "Great Odin's eye patch if Anxiety comes back and wakes me up, I swear I will knock his unwhitened teeth out and then call you."

 "Princey this is serious,"

"Morality my beauty sleep is serious!" and with a huff Princey pulled the blanket up to his shoulder and rolled away from the other two.

As the other two left, Princey thought as he drifted off to sleep again, why did they need to go searching for Anxiety anyway, why don't they just call him?

 

 


	5. Big teary reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This- this became so much longer than I had planned.  
> And this isn't the end

Logic's hands gripped the steering wheel tighter. 

Why couldn't life be like a film?

In a film when a search party was sent out they always found the person they were looking for with ease, there was a big teary reunion and they lived happily ever after. There never seemed to be a question of what direction they needed to go to actually find the person in the first place.

But the second he started the car, Morality looked left and right down the empty street and then turned to him and said, "Alright Logic which way do we go?"

Logic stared at him blankly for a few seconds, then he swallowed nervously. He was the Logical side, the one with the plan, the knowledge, the right answers. Morality was counting on him to know what to do. Even if he didn't.

"Left, Thomas is left handed, so Anxiety would have gone left when he left the house."

And with that he drove the car slowly and steadily down the street. Praying that he was right.

That had been over an hour ago and he and Morality were still driving around the dark streets with no sign of Anxiety.

 Logic had never felt more helpless in his life, (except for that time in 1st grade when for some unexplainable reason Thomas asked him what to put on a Valentine's day card - he thought "Your handwriting is very presentable" was a very nice compliment), he felt his stress levels getting higher and higher with every corner they turned without seeing Anxiety.

He was also starting to have extremely unproductive thoughts as he drove, what if Anxiety tried hitchhiking? What if he ran off into some woods? What if he had gone to the right when leaving the house? They would never find him.

The car turned the next corner Logic suddenly involuntarily gasped when he saw the black huddled figure underneath the street light. Morality saw him at the same time and started squealing and leaned over and hit the horn. Anxiety jumped violently at the sound of the horn, looking up into the headlights like a frightened dear.

"Thank goodness we finally found-MORALITY DO NOT LEAVE THE VEHICLE WHILE IT IS STILL MOVING!" screamed Logic.

But Patton had already unbuckled his seat belt, thrown open the door and jumped out of the car. Then immediately lost his footing as the earth was moving too fast underneath him causing him to stumble and fall on the asphalt. Morality rolled over onto his side and clambered to his feet, that hurt and it would leave bruises tomorrow but he didn't care, they had found him, finally found him.

~~~~~~

When the car had come around the corner Anxiety had considered making a run for it. His imagination was working overtime - clearly this car was filled with evil gang leaders and drug lords who were going to kill him in a drive by shooting or obviously this was a drunk driver who was going to mount the curve and send him flying into the windscreen shattering both of kneecaps so he would never walk again or probably in that car was - HONK

Oh god who knew cars could make such a terrifying sound, thought Anxiety jumping out of his skin, he looked up but the headlights were blinding he couldn't see how many people where in the car, suddenly the side door opened and a person fell out. Oh god thought Anxiety I'm witnessing someone dumping a body. Then the person got up, threw there arms wide and ran at him.

Zombie?!? panicked Anxiety. He tried to scream but his throat was too sore. He stumbled backwards and tripped over his own feet and landed heavily on his side on the sidewalk.  Instinctively he curled into a ball to try and protect himself when he heard, "ANXIETY,"

"D-DAD?"

Morality leaped onto him and crushed him into a hug. Anxiety burst into noisy sobs, clutching at Morality grabbing fistfuls of his cardigan desperate to hold onto as much of the other side as possible.  

"You-you came-,"

"We were so worried-,"

"I got lost - I'm so sorry-,"

"So glad your safe-,"

"so s-sorry, I'm so stupid-"

"Oh sweet sugar dumplings your freezing-"

"Pl-please take me home, I'm sorry I ruined everything,"

 By this time Logic had managed to pull the car over and join the other two. He had never felt so relieved.

"Anxiety - Anxiety, listen you need to calm down everything is going to be alright, Patton help me get him up and into the car, its time we all went home,"

As they stood Logic and Morality see just how badly the other side was shaking from the cold.

"Ohhh kiddo we need to get you inside and warmed up now," said Morality

Logic pulled a checked handkerchief from his pocket and started to wipe the snot that was dripping down Anxiety's face from his crying and his runny nose.

"Thank yo-" Anxiety started to say but was interrupted by another coughing fit. Morality intertwined his arm with Anxiety's and Logic put his hand on his other shoulder and they walked him to the car.

"Seat belts on," instructed Logic as he got back into the drivers seat, as the others sat next to each other in the back. Morality leaned against Anxiety trying to share his body heat with the other side, Anxiety found himself relaxing into the comforting warmth. The drive back home seemed ridiculously short given the amount of time Anxiety had been walking but he wasn't going to question it.

When they got back Morality helped Anxiety into some fresh warm pajama's, while Logic went and heated up a hot water bottle for him. They didn't say anything when he put his hoodie back on over the top of his pajamas and climbed into bed. Everyone was exhausted and in need of some well earned sleep. Anxiety kept muttering about how everything was his fault and he was an idiot but the others just hushed him and said everything was alright the important thing was he was home safe. They tucked him into bed and Morality kissed him on the forehead (Anxiety was so glad it was dark and Dad couldn't see how hard he was blushing) and they started to close his door when-

"Dad wait," said Anxiety

Morality came back into the room. Anxiety sat up and then leaned over and grabbed a plastic bag that was lying under the bed. He handed the bag to Morality.

"Here, you-you can have these if you want, they are the candy canes that well you know," Anxiety muttered dropping his head with shame as he remembered how he ruined Morality's "Early Elves" by telling everyone it was him who put the sweets on the tree.

Morality put the bag on his bed side table.

He doesn't want them, thought Anxiety sadly, its not the same if its not the "Early Elves" is it? That's what makes it special isn't it, it's not good enough if I do it.

Anxiety sniffed, its just my cold he thought I don't suddenly feel like crying cause he doesn't want-

"Lets put them on the tree together tomorrow, it'll be heaps of fun,"

"Huh,"

"Tomorrow, we can put them on the tree together, maybe Logic and Princey can help too? It's our special last decoration for the tree, " smiled Morality

Anxiety was confused -or maybe just too tired? He hadn't ruined it, it was still special to Morality but why?

"Goodnight Anxiety, I'm so happy we found you and your home safe and sound,"

"Night Dad, and - thanks for finding me,"

 


	6. Morning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry its taken long to update - life's been flat out at the moment.  
> And we are back to Princey being a ninny again.

Princey was annoyed. And he was annoyed that he was annoyed because being annoyed meant that you frowned and frowning leads to premature forehead wrinkles and that is just unacceptable.

It was also unacceptable that both Morality and Logic were late and making him wait.

It was 7.30am and the two other sides had agreed that they would go out nice and early to get started on their and Thomas's present shopping.

Princey was standing in his corner of the living room huffing with impatience, he couldn't even take his mind off things by looking around the room at the glorious decorating that he had done because sitting over at the small table detracting from the beautiful room was Anxiety.  

And he couldn't even enjoy the peaceful morning bird's chirping because Anxiety would inconsiderately sniff or cough unexpectedly.  Princey wished he would finish his half eaten buttered toast and leave (seriously he wasn't even eating it, just moving it around the plate), he was like a black hole in middle of the bright universe that was the living room.

~~~~

Anxiety still felt unwell but better than last night - because his headache had subsided and he wasn't out in the cold anymore. But his chest still ached and it was hard to breath and he just couldn't stop coughing.

That was why he was downstairs now, even though he was still exhausted from his late night, a strong coughing fit had woken him up and he couldn't get back to sleep. He thought he might as well get up and try and eat something for breakfast. He had made his plain toast but found he didn't have the appetite to eat it. So he was just sitting at the table when Princey showed up to make his own breakfast and coffee.

Anxiety hunched over his cold food. He didn't know what to do. He could barely have a civil conversation with Princey at the best of times, but after last night. What should he do? Apologize? - But his apologies always sounded terrible, they always came out unfeeling and standoffish, and with Princey that usually just ended up starting another argument (accusing him of not really meaning it).  Should he pretend like last night didn't happen? - This was what he usually did but he always felt guilty and he knew the others always felt bitter and resentful that the issue he caused wasn't resolved - Like that "Am I original" video. God why couldn't he stop being the bad guy for once.

~~~~

Princey was fed up with waiting. He summoned Morality and Logic to the living room. They both appeared tired, disorientated and still in their pajama's.

They looked around foggily, rubbing the sleep from their eyes "What's going on," they asked sleepily

"Would you two look at the time!" cried Princey "It is a glorious day and you two are very late for our exciding adventure into the magical world of our shopping district," as he tapped his watch meaningfully.

The other sides groaned. Actually groaned - Princey was shocked. Nobody but nobody should display such a reaction to the prospect of a shopping spree. Maybe they misheard him - yes that had to be it, they must have heard the word "Shipping" instead.

"Come along now and get dressed, time waits for no man and neither does a good sale," said Princey

"I hate to be a downpour on our Mr Sunshine but Princey I'm just too tired," said Morality stifling a yawn.

"I have to agree with Patton, our usual sleeping patterns were interrupted last night and I think in the best interest of our cognitive functions that we try and catch up the missed hours this morning. We can make alternative arrangements for our plans to go shopping at a later date," said Logic

Princey gasped. Postpone shopping!

Premature wrinkles be dammed, he glared at Anxiety. The other side winced at the ferocity of that glare.

"Oh but it's good to see the thing that caused us to be up half the night is up bright and early this morning," he snarled sarcastically.

Patton frowned he thought it was a bit rich for Princey to say that he was up half the night when he actually went to bed - Oh hey there's Anxiety sitting at the table! Patton hadn't noticed him because he was still half asleep. He turned to the other side and waved cheerily at him "Good morning Anxiety,"

"This is unbelievable, decorating was trainwreck, my beauty sleep was ruined and now shopping - Christmas shopping! - is in jeopardy and its entirely his fault! Anxiety how could you do this," fumed Princey

"I-I didn't mean to," muttered Anxiety sinking further down in his chair.

"Princey we can just go in the afternoon," said Logic

Princey moaned, that was a logical and reasonable suggestion and he hated it.

"Anxiety do you have any idea how important shopping is? How much work the three of us have to put into these trips? To ensure we and Thomas get the perfect gifts. The window shopping, trying on clothes together, looking at all the toys, the difficulty of staying on task hunting for presents when we're having so much fun together -"

"No. I don't. You-you've never invited me to come with you before," said Anxiety. He immediately regretted it when the words left his mouth - they sounded sulky and immature.

"Oh you poor baby-" started Patton but Princey interrupted him.

"Don't try blaming us for your introvert lifestyle. It's not our fault that everywhere is apparently too loud or has too many people that you supposedly feel like your suffocating or are "Overwhelmed". Perhaps if you showed any interest in actually leaving the house occasionally, instead of always brooding in your room," snapped Princey. Princey turned back to the others with his hands on his hips.

"Alright here's what we are going to do; Logic, Morality - go back to bed, get your needed rest- I need you both functioning at your best to ensure that we and Thomas have a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious holidays, we cannot carry on at the rate we are going (here he gave a meaningful stare to Anxiety who missed it because he started coughing again), and we must get back on track. I will take Thomas for a preliminary shopping expedition and we will rendezvous again in the afternoon and I will report my findings on potential gifts, and perhaps purchase a few items that we find that are amazing that we absolutely must purchase,"

"Um, I don't think it's a good idea for you or Thomas to go out shopping while listening to only your most wonderful, romantic, fanciful thoughts - especially with a credit card," said Logic

"Oh don't worry I can control myself, it will be fine," and with that Princey left the living room.  

 


	7. Not a "Real" Update

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is not an update to the story (sorry) but I needed a place to vent about life imitating art because this is a such a coincidence - what are the fucking chances.

Okay so let me just say to start off with when I started writing this fic - I knew what I was going to have happened to Anxiety and you may have guessed where I am heading from the hints I have been dropping through the story and in replies to peoples comments at the end of the chapters

But just in case you haven't guessed I won't say it directly here and spoil the next few chapters where I will reveal it, (Or you can skip this part in case you accidently guess it here)

But;

At the start of this week I get a text from my mother - the usual; how are you, what have you been doing etc.  I ask back how she's doing and she says she's been a bit unwell with a cold, my at home siblings are being lazy, they can't even get off the couch to get her a glass of water (this is not unusual, honestly the dog is probably the most sympathetic to her) and we made plans for me to go over and have dinner with them on Sunday.

That's that - I don't hear anything else for the rest of the week. I turn up to their place tonight, ask how's mum doing is she over the cold yet.

Get the reply - she has ****

Me: What! That's terrible are you okay?

Mother: Oh I'm doing better now, I am resting and have antibiotics and -

Father jumps in: Didn't you tell her that you have *****?

Mother: No, she was coming over tonight so I'm telling her now

Me: When did you find out you have *****

Mother: Well, on Tuesday - I thought it was a bit more than a cold and I might have ***** but we didn't know until we saw the Doctor on Thursday night.

Father jumps in again:  When she says saw the Doctor, that was after she coughed up blood and we called the ambulance and they took her to the hospital.

Me: WHAT?

Father to Mother: You didn't tell her you were in hospital?

Mother:  Well they didn't keep me in there, everything is fine now.

Sister: It was awful when they took her to hospital, we had to put Peaches (the dog) in the other room so she wouldn't bother the paramedics and then they took Mum and she didn't get to say goodbye (to the dog) and then Peaches kept walking through all the rooms looking for her and whimpering.

Sister to dog: You where so upset, weren't you aww poor Peaches. Poor, poor Peaches. (Mother actually nods in agreement)

Brother walks in (making his brief nightly appearance off the computer to eat just enough dinner to support the pale lanky muscles that hold his neck up to allow him to continue gaming for 6hours):  *Cough* Mum - I'm getting sick, you've given me *****

Mother: You are going to school tomorrow!

* * *

Sooooo,

Nobody knows that I write fan fiction; so I can't exclaim that I am actually going to have ***** happen to a character in my story. But I did spend the night asking Mum what is it like, how does it feel etc. - because I am obviously her concerned child worried about her welfare, not because I am trying to ideas about what's going to happen to Anxiety and make it more realistic.

Although she did have an interesting X-ray to show me and apparently when the paramedic's asked her on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the worst pain you have ever felt (her 10 was birth of my brother) this was 7. And also after the morphine kicked in the pain was still a 2.   

 


	8. Verge of Disaster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The following events/conversations/etc. occur onwards from afternoon of the last chapter and then carry over the next few days or so. Everything is business as normal in the Sanders household - right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was difficult to write but hopefully its not too confusing or lacking in detail. Its just to show the progression of Anxiety's sickness and how the sides handle it, or lack of handling it.

When Morality woke up later a bit more refreshed he was excited when he went down to the living room and spied the first of the wrapped presents placed under the tree. He raced over to them - Thomas and Princey must have put them there after their shopping trip. Now he wasn't going to peek of course. Just look at who the gifts were from and maybe just give them a little squeeze, in case one felt like a puppy and needed air holes.

But he was a bit confused at the name tags.

There was;

  * To Thomas From Princey
  * To Princey From Thomas
  * To Joan <3 Thomas
  * To Roman <3 Princey
  * To Talyn From Thomas
  * To Princey love Roman
  * To Princey from your secret admirer
  * To Prince Charming Roman from your many fans
  * To Roman from Secret Santa
  * To Roman from your fanciful side
  * To His Royal Highness The Prince from TBA.



 Morality looked at all the brightly colored presents all different shapes and sizes. He didn't know they were doing a Secret Santa.

*

Later in the afternoon, when Anxiety was lying on his bed trying to get some rest he heard Logic's voice echo through the house, followed by a ripple of worry surge through him caused by Thomas;

"YOU SPENT HOW MUCH? DO YOU KNOW WHAT A BUDGET IS? DO YOU WANT TO LIVE ON FOOD STAMPS!"

Ah, thought Anxiety, Logic has asked Thomas how much he and Princey spent at the shops.

*

I really must dash off if I have any hope of finding some real holly bushes and mistletoe for the house, thought Princey. And hopefully when I return Logic will have calmed down a bit. I don't know why he has his knickers in such a twist - Its Christmas, a little overspending is expected. Honestly it's his fault really when you think about it, for not anticipating a bit of a splurge.

*

"Hey Kiddo, how's everything doing," asked Morality as he stuck his head into Anxiety's bedroom.

"Er, still not feeling that great to be honest," said Anxiety

"I'll tell you what I'll make some chicken soup for dinner tonight, that will clear your cold right up,"

"Thanks, your a great guy Pat-*cough*cough*

*

♫ Deck the halls with boughs of holly ♫

Fa Fa la la la la la la la!  
  
'Tis the season to be jolly ♫  sang Princey down the halls

*

 "Chicken soup Patton? But tonight's Pizza night" asked Princey

"Sorry Roman, but I'm making something special to help get rid of Anxiety's cold,"

"Don't you think he's milking this a bit, I mean its just a cold,"

"Now come on Roman, be nice, remember I took care of you when you were unwell,"

"But what happened to me was a serious condition! I couldn't even appear on camera!"

 

 *

"Okay Thomas, now I want you to list down all the people you need to purchase gifts for, and then you are going to talk to Morality about what he thinks they might like. You are going to focus on "It's the thought that counts" not the most expensive thing you can find that you think they "might" like"

"Okay Logic, thanks, sometimes I just get a bit carried away and buy things without thinking,"

"Humph, if you mean "carried away" Princey lifted you up, threw you over his shoulder and carried you off into the sunset on horseback, then yes you got carried away"

"... I promise in the new year I will get my credit score on track,"

"... we both know that's not going to happen,"

*

♫ Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Claus,  
Right down Santa Claus lane ♫♫♫

*

Anxiety knocked on Logic's door.

"Come in," Logic called, "Hello Anxiety, can I help you with something,"

"Actually I was wondering if you knew what sort of medicine I should take for this cold, particularly what sort of painkillers?"

"Are you experiencing a headache?"

"A little bit, but it's more my chest - it aches from coughing so much, but I don't want take the wrong kind of medicine and what if there are side effects and-"

Logic held up a hand, he remembered the other traits paranoia with medications, always worrying he'll get the dosage wrong or every side effect will happen to him or it would affect Thomas too.

"I will look into what medication would be most appropriate for you,"

*

At night Anxiety would have an even more disrupted sleep than usual. Normally it was his negative thoughts that kept him awake. But now every time his tired eyes drooped and he felt like he was finally falling asleep another coughing fit would hit him.

*

Princey dreamed comfortably. Being the creative side, he could control what he dreamed about. And now as he slept visions of sugar plums danced in his head.

*

Logic would never admit it to anyone but at this time of the year he switched his usual routine of counting sheep, to listing off everything in the twelve days of Christmas.

*

Patton sometimes found it hard to sleep, not because he was troubled but because he would get too exited thinking about what fun things tomorrow held.

*

He woke up, his clothes were soaked with sweat. And he was shivering because if it. He threw the wet garments off onto the floor (he would deal with them in the morning) and fumbled in his draws for something else to wear. Climbing back into bed, he started coughing again. God dammit.

*

The other sides were arguing, Anxiety could feel it. But Thomas hadn't started a video, so he didn't need to go down there really. God had he gotten any sleep? And he knew that he liked the safety of his room but now it just felt like getting up was the equivalent of mountain climbing.

"Anxiety," Whoosh. Anxiety doubled over, did being summoned always hurt like that? It felt like someone had kicked him in the ribs - What. The. Hell. was Princey wearing? 

"What on earth is that?"

"It's festive!"

"It's Yuletide holiday riddler,"

"You just don't understand fashion, you emo nightmare,"

"Okay, if you just got me here insult me and destroy my eyes retina's with - that- I'm just gonna duck out,"

"Wait, wait, we need your input on ideas for Thomas's last Sander Sides video before Thomas takes a break to go visit family," said Morality

"I plan to have a grand Christmas Carol's special, I will sing all the classics -"

"I'm not much of a singer," interrupted Logic

"And Anxiety has a cold," said Patton, right on cue Anxiety starts coughing again.

"Look the focus will be on me obviously, all of you will just be the chorus, and if Anxiety hasn't gotten over his cold when we are ready to film, he can just miss this one out - its not like the fanders will care, and Thomas will probably sing better if he's out of sight out of mind."

Anxiety dropped his shoulders - Thomas was a good singer but Anxiety did make him terribly nervous.

"Roman I'm surprised at you, you know the fanders want to see all of us," chided Morality

"Well mostly me," said Princey

"Actually I think you will find that data shows that Anxiety is the most popular persona, even Thomas's close friends find him quite endearing," put in Logic.

Princey bristled. Unintentionally (or intentionally - it was kinda hard to tell with Logic he kept such a poker face) Logic had hit a sore spot. Princey hated the fact that if you actually looked at the numbers and the comments on social media it was clear he was not the most popular, no matter how hard he pretended to ignore this fact, and he was deeply insulted that the only positive thing Thomas's good friends had said about him was that he was extra.

"Fine," snapped Princey looking at Anxiety "Since these two insisted that you have some input, do you have a better idea than my fantastic festive cheer sing-a-long?" 

Talk about being put on the spot. Anxiety could feel the stares of all three sides on him. It made him feel feverish. He- he didn't want to caroling, he would mess it up, he would never be as good as singer as Princey or Thomas even if he wasn't sick.

But everyone else loves caroling, it wouldn't stand out as an original video but at this time of year it would be appropriate, it was some thing easy for Thomas to do, so it wouldn't take his energy away from other things that he was rushing to do before leaving to visit his family, and Thomas would have fun and he would be good at it. Also Anxiety didn't have a better idea and so far he had already ruined the others sides decorating and shopping (he didn't want to spoil anything else, he didn't want to be the bad guy). Plus the quickest way for him get the others to shut up and let him get back to bed would be;

"Let's do this carol singing thing," he muttered.

Silence

"What really?" asked Morality.

"Are you feeling alright Anxiety? You actually agree with Princey? You want to caroling video?" inquired Logic looking at him skeptically.

Anxiety looked at the ground and shuffled his feet "Well, you know, whatever," and started coughing again.

"THIS IS A TRAP!" shouted Princey pointing accusingly at Anxiety.

Everyone jumped and stared at him.

"He-He's up to something I know it! Oh you thought you could pull a fast one on me you sneaky little Grinch but I'm onto you,"

"Princey calm down, there's no reason for you climb onto Anxiety," said Logic taking what the other said literally.

Princey took in a deep breath and drew himself up to his full height ready to launch into one of his usual long winded monologues except;

Anxiety coughed again and this time it brought up a clump of phlegm, which he quickly spat into a tissue.

Princey stared at him in disgusted horror and shrieked " _ **EWWWWW,**_ _ew, ew, ew ,ew""_

_*_

 When Anxiety got back to his bedroom he laid down on his bed and thought life was so unfair. When he disagrees with Princey - he's the bad guy. When he agrees with Princey - he's still the bad guy!

He shifted gingerly on his bed trying to get comfortable.

He didn't leave his room for the rest of the day - but none of the others found this unusual.

*

♫ Joy to The world! the Lord is come ♫   
Let earth receive her King  
Let ev'ry heart prepare him room  
 ♫ And heaven and nature sing ♫ 

*

Another bout of cold chills hit him again that night, he hoped this would stop soon or he would run out of things to sleep in.  

*

Princey had found Logic and Morality and dragged them to the table to make hand made Christmas cards. But it was not going well. Honestly how hard was it to do what he said.

Logic was assigned to writing the messages in the cards, but Princey needed to dictate them to him because Logic was to unemotive and un-Christmassy.

But Morality was worse, he was being - creative. Too creative and random to make proper cards. Princey couldn't understand why he thought it was okay to put in Christmas cards things like; penguins, puppies, cupcakes, helicopters, gumboots.

"Morality no! It needs to be Santa, reindeers, elves. You absolutely cannot use black - unless its for writing words,"

"But Anxiety always wears black, and this is the exact shade of his eye shadow," said Morality.

"You're drawing Anxiety?" asked Princey in shock.

"Yep, he's standing next to the tree putting a candy cane on it and-"

Princey reached over grabbed the card and tore it into pieces.

"That is absolutely the completely wrong thing to put in Christmas cards. Morality draw only what I tell you to draw. These have to be perfect, if you two aren't going to do it properly I may as well just buy a bunch from Hallmark,"

*

Later that afternoon Morality checked in on Anxiety again - he hadn't seem him all in two days. As he walked in the room he thought he saw the others light up when he saw him - was it a trick of the light? Actually there wasn't much light in here better open the curtains, thought Morality.

"Hey Patton," said Anxiety weakly as he started coughing again.

"What have you been up to today?" asked Morality.

"Um, you know listening to music, watched some Disney movies, a bit of reading. What about you guys?"

"Oh, we tried to make some Christmas cards but I wasn't too good at it I'm afraid and then Princey made me go through some cook books to find some Christmas recipes that he wants made and now he's gone out to find a Christmas hat that exactly matches the red in his sash. You know you look a bit pale, how about you come down stairs and have a bit of a snack,"

Anxiety groaned "Too much effort,"

"Have you eaten today?"

Anxiety looked a bit guilty, "Um, no,"

"Okay that's it, come down stairs and have something to eat," said Morality he then noticed the bag on Anxiety's bedside table, "And how about you, me and Logic put these on the tree," he said excitedly.

"Okay sure whatever,"

Patton was worried at the way the other winced when he got out of bed and then winced again when he coughed.

*

 Princey was applying some bronzer to Thomas's face. He was making sure he looked popping before taking a selfie under the mistletoe. Logic and Morality appeared.

"ooh that looks like a fun makeover, can I play?" asked Morality.

"Sorry Morality this is to make sure all Thomas's fans see his best side for his Christmas shots, it's very important," replied Princey.

"What's up guys?" asked Thomas

"Anxiety is ill and I have determined that he should remain in bed until he recovers," said Logic getting straight to the point.

"Pfft, he's just being a hypochondriac," muttered Princey applying more bronzer.

"We just needed to make sure you were aware Thomas, in case being sick impedes his function to be your anxiety, you might have to try and be more aware if you are feeling more anxious or not feeling anxious enough over the next few days,"

"Hmm, well I don't feel any more or less anxious but Anxiety hasn't been dropping in on me in person as he usually would - I did think that was a bit odd, what's wrong with him?"

"He's got a very bad cold but don't worry I will take care of him," said Patton puffing out his chest proudly.

"Humph it's his own fault for running around outside in the middle of the night, honestly what did he expect? *GASP* Thomas I just remembered, you absolutely must look after your levels of anxiety, if they get too low you stop brushing your hair!"

*

"You know I think Anxiety is a wee bit lonely, being all sick and stuck in bed, I'm sure he would really appreciate it if you two popped into his room to visit, his bedroom isn't like his mind space you can stay in there as long as you want without anything happening to you,"

"If you think it will help aid with his recovery then certainly, I can bring some puzzles and some textbook reading materials,"

"Why in the world would I want to go into Midnight Misery's room? To look at him laying around like a frump on his bed? And this cold is probably contagious,"

"Princey, it would be nice for you-"

"And besides he always spends his days hidden away from us, only barge into our affairs quite unexpectedly when it suited him- and look at how decorating turned out because of that. Him having the sniffles isn't going to magically change that routine, he's just going to use this as an excuse to get out of joining in any of the proper festivities"

*

Nothing Morality did seemed to be making any improvement in Anxiety's condition. But he had always been able to help with the others colds in the past. Maybe Google isn't be best resource. He had better ask Logic.  

*

♫ It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas ♫  
Ev'rywhere you go;  
Take a look in the five-and-ten, glistening once again  
With candy canes and silver lanes aglow.♫ ♫

*

"Logic?"

"I thought you might like to do one of my Alice in Wonderland puzzles together, if you don't mind the company?"

"Yeah? Really, you don't mind?" Anxiety asked, Logic heard a faint longing in his voice.

Morality must have been correct in his assumption, he is lonely, thought Logic but he became concerned at what happened next.

Anxiety tried to sit up. Key word: Tried.

He couldn't without struggling, he leaned on his side and tried used his forearms to push himself up, Logic hurried over and gently put his hands on his back and pushed him up.

"Thanks," he said weakly trying to catch his breath.

Logic stayed for a few hours and observed his symptoms while they worked. Morality hadn't mentioned the lack of mobility and sitting up wasn't that daunting of a task.  

*

Princey was posing taking more selfies of himself again. This time he was trying to perfect a surprised look, trying to get that natural and happy looking "O" shape with his mouth, resting his fingers of one of his hands on his chin to show off his new nail polish, as Morality walked by heading for the stairs.

"Morality take a picture for me so I can use both my hands and have one on each cheek, it will look much better," said Princey

"Sure, that's a lovely manicure," admired Morality looking at the bright red and green nail polish.

"Of course, I did it myself,"

"Maybe you could come upstairs and show Anxiety? Maybe even offer to do his? Remember that time he colored his nails in with the Sharpie?"

"I'm afraid I'm much too busy, I really need to get these shots onto all the social media sites right away you know,"

"But... you still haven't visited him,"

*

Morality walked into Anxiety's room with a variety of colored texturs, pencils and crayons and a stack of papers, he saw Anxiety and Logic playing chess on the bed.

"What's all that?"

"Oh I thought we could make some Christmas cards together, you missed out on doing it the other day and I wasn't very good then but if you guys are in the middle of a game I can come back later and-"

"No stay, don't worry I think Logic's only four moves from beating me,"

"Two actually,"

But Anxiety had started coughing again, one hand had a tissue to cover his mouth and catch the excess phlegm,  his other arm wrapped around his chest to try and ease the pain in his ribcage.

The other sides shared a look as his face contracted in pain.

*

"Morality your making chicken soup - again?"

"Chicken soup is the best for colds, you know Princey that's a definite scientific fact,"

"But you made that the other day already!"

"Well Anxiety is still quite sick, Princey,"

"You're too much of a mother hen, you really should start focusing on making some more suitable Christmas foods for me to eat,"

*

"Logic, please eat some of this for me, before Patton comes back"

"What? Anxiety no, you need to eat this, to keep your strength up"

"I know, _i know okay,_ but I just can't - I swear I'm just not hungry, and Patton's freaking out because he thinks I'm not eating enough - Look just have some please, to stop Patton worrying, I'll eat later, its probably because I've been lying down and not doing anything that I haven't had much of an apatite,"

*

Anxiety's condition wasn't improving no matter what Logic suggested for Morality to try. Maybe Google wasn't the best resource, thought Logic, it might be time to go to an actual Doctor.

* 

When Logic advised Morality that they should take Anxiety to the Doctors, he was relieved when the Dad figure agreed so readily - normally Morality was so confident that he could take care of everyone that they didn't need to take a trip to the Doctors.

When Logic and Morality told Anxiety that they would be taking him to the Doctors the next day, they were unnerved by the how the other agreed so readily - normally Anxiety was so paranoid about taking a trip to the Doctors (catching something from someone in the waiting room, the possibility of an injection).

When Logic and Morality told Princey that they would be taking Anxiety to the Doctors the next morning, they weren't surprised that he managed to make it about him. He whined that they were meant to practice their carol singing for the video, why couldn't Anxiety take himself? Logic and Morality said that there would be plenty of time for that after they got back.

*

Anxiety lay awake again coughing. His pyjamas were soaked with sweat and it was making him cold. But he didn't bother getting up and changing.

1\. He didn't have any clean pyjama's.

2\. He couldn't change his clothes even if he wanted to, he couldn't pull the shirt over his head it was too painfull to lift his arms that high. (Morality had had to help him get dressed for bed that night).

He hoped tomorrow when he went to the Doctor he would get something to fix this.

*

 ♫Christmas Eve will find me ♫  
Where the love light gleams  
I'll be home for Christmas  
♫  If only in my dreams ♫

*

Princey had papers scattered all over the table that had the lyrics for a ton of different Chrismas carols on them. He was trying to narrow down his selection for what they (he) should sing later this afternoon for the (his) caroling video.

Princey had is back facing away from the stairs so he couldn't see Logic and Morality bringing Anxiety down.

But he could hear them. Anxiety's coughing kept breaking his concentration has he shifted through the different songs.

Honestly how long does it take to come down some stairs, he thought angrily. Princey couldn't see how cautiously Logic and Morality were guiding Anxiety down, they were worried he was going to fall down the stairs, he gripped the banister tightly (he had nearly fainted from a dizzy spell when he walked out of his room).

I need to make sure there are enough modern songs, but I also want to have some olden classics that show off my vocal skills, thought Prince as the others walked slowly by him.

"Goodbye Roman hopefully be back soon," said Logic

"Uh-huh make it quick we have a lot of work to make sure I have a good Christmas video," muttered Princey without looking up.

"Farewell"

"Take care, don't work to hard while we're gone,"

"... see you later Princey,"

 

_Later that night when Princey would be alone in his room laying on his bed, listening to Morality's (or was it Logic's) muffled sobbing coming through the walls, a wave of despair would hit him unlike anything he had ever experienced when he would realize he couldn't remember what the last thing he said to Anxiety was._

_Why?_

_Why couldn't he remember what the last thing he said to him was?_

_Why hadn't he even bothered to say "Goodbye"?_


	9. Red

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After leaving Princey back at the house to work on his sing-a-long, Logic, Morality, and Anxiety are at the Doctors waiting room and Morality thinks about the color red.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess warning for blood - not too much but still.

Morality fidgeted.

He just wasn't feeling comfortable. He couldn't explain it he just had a bad feeling.

He gave his head a little shake.

Everything is going to be fine, we are at the Doctors they will see Anxiety and fix him and then we will go home and sing with Princey and everything will be super, he thought looking around the room.

It was your typical Doctors waiting room, trying to come across as professional and friendly but only succeeded in being professional. The chairs were too close together and hard and uncomfortable. The paint scheme somehow made the room feel claustrophobic instead of calming. The calm scenery pictures on the walls were a constant reminder of a place you would rather be. The information posters on walls with preventative measures and proper care for common aliments just reminded you why you were here in the first place. Everyone spoke softly but they were much too loud. Magazines were old and offered little distraction. The old toys in the kids corner looked neglected and in need of replacement and disinfectant. And the wait was always too long.

Someone was supposed to have seen Anxiety 90minutes ago.

Logic at some point picked up a trashy teen magazine and was flipping through it with a look of utter bafflement, occasionally leaning over to ask Anxiety for clarification of a particular phase used.  

Anxiety sat between them and was looking at the wall opposite - Morality couldn't tell if he was reading the CPR poster or looking at the picture of dolphins jumping in the surf, either way he staring straight ahead chewing his bottom lip nervously.

Morality had picked up a magazine too but didn't read it when he saw Anxiety wasn't going to read anything. He had tried leaning over and whispering a few dad jokes to try and make Anxiety relax (he got a few small smiles) but the receptionist kept giving him dirty looks each time he laughed at his own jokes, eventually Logic leaned over and told him to stop or they would get kicked out. So now his mind was wandering as he scanned the room.

I wonder if anyone has walked in here and yelled IS THERE A DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE, and then someone says, yes of course and the first person then goes, oh good I'm in the right place, thought Patton.

"Logic, I've run out of tissues, do you have any?" asked Anxiety.

"Here have my handkerchief," replied Logic handing him a clean crisp white piece of cloth. 

What it would look like if you balanced a Christmas tree upside down on the point of the tree? thought Patton

Could you make a deodorant for people that dogs absolutely loved the smell of? thought Patton

Anxiety coughed hard again covering his mouth, as Patton turned to look to him, he had planned on asking him if he was okay but instead his mind went blank except for;

Why do colors make us feel different emotions?

I -I feel scared now.

So scared.

I don't want to be though.

Something is very wrong.

Red. Bright Red. Bright shiny red.

This isn't right.

I can't move. I can't speak. My-my tummy feels wrong, I've got very bad tummy wobbles. I think I might be sick now. Everything is slowing down too. Sounds are not right either.

Bright too bright. Everything is too bright. That red is too bright.

I-I need to move, I need to do something, I need to help Anxiety.

Something is very wrong.

That red - it's wrong. That red - it's scary. That red - NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO. THAT RED SHOULD GO AWAY. I DON'T LIKE IT.

RED GO AWAY. Please go away red.

Anxiety is looking at the red too.

He looks confused.

But I'm scared.

That red is more scary than spiders.

That red is wrong.

Red isn't meant to be scary!

Red is meant to be bold like a beautiful lady's lipstick.

Red is meant to be intense and passionate like Princey's sash.

Red is meant to be delightfully wonderful like biting into fresh strawberries or a juicy apple.

Red is meant to be lovely and romantic like a delicate long stem rose you give to someone to show that your feelings will never ever wither, even if the flower does.

There isn't meant to be a **red** glob on Logic's handkerchief!

Please, go away red, please.

 

Logic finally picked up that both Morality and Anxiety had gone very quite and still. Too still.

He turned and saw what they were both staring in shock at. He stood up suddenly, gently but firmly placing a hand on Anxiety's shoulder and said in a loud clear voice across the room to the receptionist, "Excuse me, my friend needs medical assistance immediately he is coughing up blood," just as Morality vomited all over the carpet.


	10. Can you hurt Christmas?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Morality and Logic come back from taking Anxiety to the Doctors. Without Anxiety.  
> Princey is oblivious and Morality has had enough.

Princey surveyed the living room again. It was perfect. This was what Christmas was all about; gorgeous decorations and an enormous pile of presents under the tree (his kept getting bigger by the day) the Sanders sides living room was perfect. Princey was in a good mood he had his favorite Christmas sweater on, a big mug of hot chocolate, he had made his selections of what carols he was going to sing for the video and had been able to practice them all afternoon without interruption and now had settled down to watch Christmas movies on the television until the others showed up, he had already finished watching Home Alone, Elf, and was almost finished watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

Actually Princey was a bit annoyed that the others were late for carolling and making him wait (again) but he distracted himself from this feeling by bursting into another tune. But really it shouldn't take this long to take someone to see a Doctor just for a silly little cold, thought Princey, another Christmas activity that Anxiety has managed to stuff up. Perhaps they have just stopped in at the grocery store to get some food supplies, Morality really needs to make a start on cooking and building a gingerbread house and making fruit mince pies. I'm getting sick of soups and bland things that are supposed to be easy on the stomach, why does Morality make us all the same things to eat? It's all so basic. I'll be glad once this Doctor finally talks some sense into those two about Anxiety. Simple bed rest and fluids that's all that's needed (hopefully the Doctor sees through all Hot Topic's nonsense and gives him a nice big flu shot in the bum, that'll teach him). When they get back there will be none of this fussing over him like a baby bird with a broken wing. Running back and forth to his room to check on him all the time its ridiculous, when we have nativity scenes to build, popcorn chains to make and a Christmas newsletter to compile and this caroling video! And I cannot believe that they didn't even want to go looking at the Christmas light displays because Anxiety "wasn't strong" enough to go and they were worried about leaving him home alone. Yes this Doctor will tell them to leave Anxiety to wallow in his own self pity and that he will recover in no time, Logic and Morality will feel so silly for the amount of time they wasted on him when they should have been focused on proper Christmas tasks.  There's only so much time a year you get to sing "The Twelve Days of Christmas" and Morality definitely has not been doing it in Anxiety's room! I actually feel a bit sorry for them for having missing out on so much but not too sorry because I've been the one that's had to pick up their slack and make sure Christmas is salvaged.

Princey heard the others opening the front door and coming down the hallway, he jumped up excitedly gathering up the copies of the carols he had selected. He beamed as he had been looking forward to this all day! He would belt his lungs out singing these tunes and the others would be ecstatic - completely enthralled by his marvelous singing. They would probably even suggest that they didn't even need to be in the video at all because Princey's singing would be that good.

As Logic and Morality walked into the living room slowly Princey shoved a copy of the songs into each of their hands and they sat on the couch with Princey standing in front of them.

Now a normal person (not a vain, hypocritical, selfish, egotistic royal) probably would have seen the other sides red rimmed eyes.

A normal person probably would have noticed the others pale pained facial expressions as they sat down on the couch.

A normal person probably would have observed the others posture how there shoulders seemed to slump with the weight of the world.

Anybody should have noticed that Anxiety was not with them. Actually this was the only thing that Princey did notice but it really wasn't that big of a deal. Well for him at least. A normal person would maybe have found it worrying that three people had gone off to the Doctors and only two had returned. A normal person would have at least asked where Anxiety was. Princey was many things but normal was not one of them. As long as Anxiety wasn't stopping Princey from doing what he wanted it didn't matter if he was sulking in his room, off at My Chemical Romance concert or even on the moon.

  
"Alright I expected you back much sooner than this but that's okay it has just given me more time to perfect these songs, now as you can see from that list I am going to start with-"

 "Princey," Interrupted Logic, as Morality just gave his piece of paper a blank 100 yard stare.

"Logic I've taken your lack of singing abilities into account, you just have a very small chorus section now-"

"Princey please we-" Logic tried again.

"Wait I know what you're going to say. I did consider having Jingle Bells first but if you listen to me sing everything through it makes much more sense to have it third," said Princey.

"No, Princey listen we need to tell you something important," said Logic firmly.

"Can't it wait until after this?" asked Princey.

 "No it can't. It's about Anxiety," said Logic and a normal person would have heard the strain in his voice.

Princey didn't. He groaned. That got Morality's attention he looked up from his page just in time to see Princey roll his eyes.

"Oh Logic honesty you two have spent the entire morning with Anxiety-"

"Yes and we need to tell you-"

"And now you two finally get back here you want to waste even more of our precious rehearsal time  _talking_ about Anxiety,"

"Yes because-"

"You two do realize how important this Christmas video is right?"

"Princey what has happened to Anxiety is important!"

"Anxiety is not more important than Christmas!"

WHAM

Princey suddenly had a very nice view of the ceiling as he was now lying flat on his back on the living room floor. Morality had surged up from the couch and shoved him as hard as he could in the chest knocking him over. Princey laid there stunned. Logic put his hands over his mouth in shock his eyes going wide.

Morality was breathing heavily glaring down at Princey. His eyes glistened with unshed tears but his face was contorted with rage. Princey was thoroughly baffled at what had just happened - Morality had just _pushed_ him. Morality had never laid a hand on anyone as far as Princey knew.

"Morality what in the world has gotten into you?" asked Princey.

"Shush," said Morality quietly.

"What?!?"

"Just shush."

"You have the gall to tell me not to speak! How dare you!" exclaimed Princey as he rolled onto his hands and knees and started to get up but at that moment Morality snapped.

"FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE WILL YOU JUST SHUT UP!" screamed Patton as he launched himself onto the crouched Prince and let loose a flurry of punches into his back and shoulders giving off a deep sickening thumping sounds as the impact vibrated through Princey's chest. In Morality's chest his own heart was twisted in so many knots it felt like it was going to break with everything that had happened already that day.

THUMP

"JUST SHUT UP."

THUMP

"YOU JERK, YOU BRAT, YOU BIG MEANIE."

"Morality please stop!" cried Logic.

THUMP, THUMP

"YOU'RE HORRIBLE, YOU DON'T EVEN CARE THAT HE'S GONE, YOU WALNUT, YOU-YOU DUCKING FRICK PRINCE."

THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

"ow"

"Morality, please that's enough," said Logic wrapping his arms around the others waist trying to pull him off Princey.

"YOU SMELLY JELLYBEAN, YOU BUM BURP, ANXIETY IS JUST AS IMPORTANT AS CHRISTMAS!"

THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

"VIRGIL IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN CHRISTMAS!"

THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

"ow, ow, I'm sorry please stop," begged Princey.

"YOU POO POO HEAD, YOU DONUT-FLUFFLES ROVERTOOT!"

THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

"YOU COTTEN HEADED NINNY MUGGINS!" 

"PATTON PLEASE STOP YOU'RE HURTING HIM!" wailed Logan.

"NO I'M NOT!" screamed Patton getting off Princey and storming across the room, "IF I WANTED TO HURT HIM I WOULD DO _THIS!"_   he shouted as he kicked the pile of presents under the tree as hard as he could. Brightly colored boxes went flying everywhere. Patton kicked them again and again.

"Or I would do this!" he shouted as he shoved the Christmas tree over and then jumped on it.

There was a sickening snap as the middle of the tree broke in two. He tore at the tinsel and threw it around the room and then stated grabbing baubles off the tree and threw them at the walls. They shattered on impact bursting into a million tiny shards. There is a very unique sound a bauble makes when it gets broken it gives off a sound of something so delicate, innocent and pure breaking, it sounds so wrong and this sound now filled the living room as the others watched in horror as Morality threw more and more decorations around the room in a rage. Tears were running down his cheeks. Suddenly as Morality raised his arm to hurtle another bauble across the room a bright blue one this time but he stopped because:

" _PLEASE PATTON I'M SORRY! IT'S ALL MY FAULT I'M SO SORRY"_

Patton paused in his rampage and turned. It wasn't Princey who screamed it was Logan.

"It's all my fault I'm sorry," whispered Logic. He was still kneeling next to Princey tears had started welling in his eyes behind his glasses.

"It's all my fault, I-I should have suggested going to a real Doctor sooner instead of relying on google to identify symptoms I jumped to a conclusion and made the wrong diagnosis. I-I should have offered to help you care for him s-sooner. And-and I shouldn't have stopped you going after him that night! He wouldn't have b-been out in the cold until three in the morning if it wasn't for me! You wanted to go after him. Oh Patton I'm so sorry, why did I stop you?" sobbed Logic. "Why did I stop you?"

Morality's rage subsided as he listened to the sorrow in the other's voice. Logic believed everything he just said, he believed that this was really his fault. He slipped back into 'Dad Mode' and walked over and knelt down next to Logic dropping the blue bauble it didn't break but bounced on the floor next to them. For someone so smart Logic could be incredibly silly sometimes. Logic had fixated on that one tiny detail, that he had stopped Patton going after Anxiety and was beating himself up about it. God he had probably been beating himself up about it since that night when Anxiety hadn't come back on his own.

"Shh it's not your fault," said Patton.

"It is - I know it is-"

"It's not-"

"Why did I assume it was just a cold-"

"We all thought it was just a cold-"

"I should have taken his illness more seriously - Why do I even bother wearing this necktie?"

"It's going to be okay-"

"What if he _dies?_ "

" _Don't_ say that! They will take care of him,"

"But people can _die_ from it,"

"He won't,"

"You don't know that, you're just trying to make me feel better but you don't know for certain. _Why did I stop you going after him_?" and with that Logic broke down completely sobbing hysterically in the Morality's arms. He had been trying so hard to be calm and in control for the whole day, he was the Logical side, he wasn't supposed to get emotional that wouldn't help anyone and the others were counting on him. How was he supposed to help Anxiety if he got emotional? But now he couldn't hold back anymore he was upset and scared.

"Come on Logan get up, lets go to your room and rest. You're right I don't know for sure but the Doctors are doing everything they can now. Come on up you get." Said Morality gently lifting the other to his feet and slowly guiding him to the stairs as the other continued to let out anguished sobs. As they started to ascend the stairs Morality looked back at the living room.

It was destroyed. And there was Roman still crouched down in the center of it all in the exact same spot where Morality had started hitting him. Next to him was that stupid little blue bauble with "Thomas" written on it. Roman's eyes met Morality's and Morality saw through the fear and confusion, the unasked question they held. The question that he should have asked the second they came home.

Morality's anger for the royal was gone now he just felt numb. Morality gave Logic a gentle push and told him to wait for him in his room. After Logic was out of ear shot Morality turned back to Prince. He stared coldly into the others brown eyes and said in an expressionless voice.

"I'm not going to make dinner tonight. Call and order some pizza, we haven't eaten anything since breakfast - actually I puked my breakfast over the Doctors waiting room floor- so I haven't eaten anything at all today."

Princey's eyes widened slightly. He-he wasn't going tell him?

Princey gave a small jerky nod he couldn't speak. His eyes pleaded. His lower lip trembled. Morality knew it only did that when he was truly upset.

Morality stared at him for one more moment and then continued up the stairs without a word.

Princey stared after him.

He didn't tell him. He didn't know. He didn't know what happened. He didn't know where Anxiety was. He didn't know if he was going to be okay.

He picked up the blue bauble with shaking hands and looked around the room. It was a mess, it was a disaster zone, it-it-it didn't matter. He stood up and walked over to the demolished tree to inspect the damage he wasn't sure why but stopped and flinched when something cracked loudly under his shoes. It sounded like someone cracking their knuckles. Looking down he saw it was a small candy cane broken clean in two under his weight. There were lots of small candy canes scattered on the floor they had fallen from the tree when Morality shoved it over and jumped on it.

When-When had candy canes been put on the tree?

 Dimly he was aware that the television was still on and the words played pierced his heart.

_I wonder who could have done this. Tell you people one thing: Invite the Grinch... ...destroy Christmas. Invite the Grinch... ...destroy Christmas! But did anyone listen to me? No. You choose to listen... ...to a little not-to-be-taken-seriously girl... ...who hasn't even grown into her nose yet. Cindy, I hope you're very proud... ...of what you've done. If she isn't, I am. I'm glad he took our presents. - What? - I.... - I'm glad. - He's glad. You're glad. You're glad everything is gone. You're glad that the Grinch virtually wrecked.... No, not wrecked, pulverized Christmas. Is that what I'm hearing? You can't hurt Christmas, Mr. Mayor... ...because it isn't about the gifts or the contests or the fancy lights. That's what Cindy's been trying to tell everyone. And me. She's been trying to tell me. What is wrong with you? This is a child. She's my child. And she happens to be right, by the way. I don't need anything more for Christmas than this right here, my family._

Roman didn't know where Anxiety was.

~~~~

Guilt. It's a powerful force. One you can't really explain unless you experience first hand. Like gravity, compound interest, love.  

If you are a fragment of a person's personality encompassing said person's Morality the feelings like guilt (especially when you have done wrong) are all the more powerful.

Morality knew it was wrong to leave Princey like that and not tell him what was going on. Especially after Logic started shouting about Anxiety might die.

Morality felt awful. Now he still felt angry at the Prince for how he had behaved for the past week and how he behaved when they got home but - but no one deserved to be left the way he had left Princey in the living room.

He gave Logic an extra big squeeze on the bed they were sitting on and handed him some more tissues.

"I just have to go for one minute Lo okay, I'll be back in a jiffy," he said. The other blew his nose and nodded.

Morality left the room and headed back down the stairs stopping halfway leaning over the white bannister. Princey was cradling that blue bauble and some candy canes against his chest like they were precious jewels with tears streaming down his cheeks. Princey had always insisted that he never cried because he was strong and brave and crying made your eyes red and puffy and he couldn't allow himself to look anything less than perfection.

"Princey," the other jumped at the sound of his name and looked up at Morality, "Princey while we were waiting to see the Doctor Anxiety coughed up blood in the waiting room. I-I freaked out and vomited all over the place, the receptionist was so angry with me - I don't think I like her very much. But the Doctors there were very nice to Anxiety be-because he had a mild panic attack after he saw the blood and me being sick. Logic was so brave the way he stayed calm to help us. We had to take Anxiety to hospital and they did some tests on him."

Morality took a deep breath and continued," He has been diagnosed with pneumonia. The tests and x-rays show that the infection is in both of his lungs. And the Doctors said that there is also a significant amount of fluid in his lungs. He requires oxygen therapy to help him breath because he isn't getting enough air," here Patton made a hand gesture of shoving two fingers up his nose.

"And he had to be given a special thingy in his arm - a drip?" more hand gestures poking his arms "because the Doctor said he needed special medicine and fluids because he was so dehydrated. And they also gave him morphine which they said is special medicine to make his chest stop hurting so bad, because the Doctors asked how bad it was hurting out of 10 and Virgil said 7 but-but I think it went higher because he had another panic attack when they said that he would have to remain in the hospital for treatment and-and we weren't allowed to stay with him. He got upset when they said Logic and I had to leave and the Doctors gave him another injection," sniffed Morality about halfway through his explanation he had started crying again. "Princey do-do you want to come up to Logic's room I think we should all be together right now."

 Princey had never ran up the stairs so fast in his life.  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay few things one - so sorry this took so long - my internet went down for days so I hadn't been able to write/post  
> two - thank you so much for everyone who has stuck with this story - I hope this was worth the wait  
> three - also thank you those who posted comments on the previous chapters, you might have noticed I have stole some of you kind (or not kind) words and put them into this chapter.


	11. Christmas past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Remember that blue bauble that keeps popping up in this story- this is its story.

Thomas  was excited.

But most little boys are at Christmas time.

However he was extra excited at this moment in time because he and his brothers were at a special craft station and they were going to personalize their own decorations!

There was a nice lady dressed in an elf costume who lead young Thomas over to a selection of baubles.

"What's your name my little Prince Charming?" she asked.

"Th-Thomas," he mumbled looking down at his sneakers as his little cheeks blushed at compliment the nice lady gave him. He always felt shy talking to new grown ups.

"Have you been a good boy this year Thomas?" the nice lady asked.

"Yes." said Thomas nodding his head vigorously.

"That's fantastic I must remember to pass that onto Santa when I see him."

Thomas gasped; the nice lady could talk directly to Santa! She was amazing. "Okay Thomas now I want you to pick out a bauble - a special one just for you."

Thomas looked at all the different colors to choose from there were so many. He looked over at his brothers who had already picked theirs and were sitting at a little table. They had chosen bright Christmassy reds and greens.

Thomas bit his bottom lip. So many colors. He didn't know which one to pick. He kinda felt like there were lots of different voices all telling him to pick different colors - get the red, get the green, get the blue, I've never seen a _black_ bauble before, get the same as your brothers, get something different than your brothers so it stands out, that purple is nice, ask the lady what she thinks, touch them, no don't touch them, there're so pretty, the lady is waiting don't take so long, is that one _gold,_ can boys pick pink ones?

Thomas was getting nervous "Um, um I-I don't know," he said sadly he felt like he was getting tummy wobbles.

"It's okay there's no wrong choice just listen to your heart sweetie,"

"Um ( _ **pick that blue one! )**_ okay, I want that blue one," said Thomas pointing to a bright light blue bauble.

"Good choice, now come over here to the craft table and I will show you some special glitter glue pens and you can write your name on the bauble - do you know how to write your name?"

"Yes! um well I think so but I've only tried on papers."

"I can help if you're not sure."

"Thank you pretty lady,"

"Well aren't you just the sweetest."

~~~

Later when little Thomas and his brothers were at home Thomas would get the tummy wobbles again.

It was of his bauble.

Well not really - he liked his bauble very much, he liked the blue color and he liked that it bounced if you dropped it.

No he was getting tummy wobbles again because Mommy said that they had to put their baubles on the tree.

Thomas didn't want to put his on the tree.

His bauble is nice on its own.

It wasn't good enough for the tree.

He knows it isn't. Well he thinks he does. All those different voices are saying different things again!

But the big bright strong voice that likes adventures and coloring and dress up doesn't want to put it on the tree.

Because the bauble doesn't match and the words are all wobbly. Thomas isn't as good as writing as his brothers yet. And he should have picked red and green like his brothers - their baubles match the other decorations, his will look different. There are no other blue decorations anywhere.

The bauble isn't good enough for the Christmas tree. The Christmas tree has to be perfect. If Thomas puts his bauble on it will be ruined.

Thomas wants to cry.

Thomas's mommy finds him trying to hide the bauble in the laundry.

But she doesn't know he's trying to hide it, she thinks he's just playing with it, she goes and puts it on the tree right in the middle.

Thomas does start crying.

"Thomas what's wrong."

"It-it all bad,"

"What is?"

"The b-bauble."

"Why?"

"Cause the words are wobbly and it's d-different to everything."

"I thought you had fun making it and that you liked the color - that's what you said in the car."

"I did have fun. I love the bauble. But-but it's not red or green it won't look pretty on the tree."

Thomas's Mommy hugs him.

"Thomas listen to Mommy, this bauble is very very special and must go on the tree. Not because it is pretty because Christmas is not about being pretty. Christmas is about love and family. That is what is important so Thomas please always remember that. You are my special little angel, you made this bauble, you love this bauble and I love you and guess what Mommy loves the bauble too. So it must stay on the tree so we can be reminded of how much we love each other."

Thomas sniffs wiping his eyes on the back of his sleeve.

"And you know what else? Your bauble _is_ pretty even if it is different to all the other decorations. You can be different and still be pretty remember that too Thomas."

 

 


	12. Christmas Present

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I plan for more chapters and longer chapters too soon but life is getting in the way I'm sorry please be patient.

"And then when Thomas moved out of home his mother gave him the blue bauble, as well as a few spare decorations for his apartment until he was able to go out and buy his own Christmas things and that is how we ended up with it," said Logic holding up the blue "Thomas" bauble that Princey had brought into his room when he came upstairs with Morality, he twirled ball around in his fingers, "I must say the glitter glue on it has lasted remarkably well,"

"I - I can't believe I forgot the story of how special this bauble is- even after I was the one that choose the color," admitted Morality "Oh-oh I can't believe I nearly _threw_ it at the wall."

"I -I can't-" muttered Princey looking away from the others staring at the floor, "I can't believe that even when we were that small I was such a, well such an - ass- back then about irrelevant materialistic nonsense,"

"This-this is all my fault. If I wasn't sure a grade A A-hole to Anxiety when we were putting up the decorations, he-he wouldn't have..." Princey started welling up again.

"Oh Princey,"

"And-and I didn't even bother to help you two go look for him. I went to bed! And-and you asked me to visit him this week and I didn't even bother to do that! Not once.  And -and now _I can't see him_. I can't talk to him. I can't tell him I'm sorry," Roman burst into tears again.

Morality got up from Logic's desk chair and sat down next to him on the bed and patted him on the back.

"Come on Princey d-don't start again cause y-your just going to make me-" Morality burst into tears again.

Logic who was sitting at the other end of the bed, put the blue bauble down on his bedside table, put his hands on his knees and stared up at the ceiling and tried to count back from 10.

10, 9, deep breaths, 8,7, slowly in and out, 6, 5 - ah nope. Logic burst into tears again too.


	13. Trapped with your own thoughts

How did they expect him to sleep?

Let alone sleep well?

He was stuck in a strange place, alone, sick, (scared - not that anyone needed to know that) and uncomfortable.

And there is nothing to distract him from his own thoughts.

Seriously _how_  was anyone supposed to sleep with _tubes_ sticking out of them? _What if he fell asleep and rolled over and they got ripped out?_

And the bed wasn't comfy it was hard and the sheets were all stiff and starchy.

This placed even smells unpleasant like mix of vomit and disinfectant and stale air and cheap soap.

They wouldn't even let him keep his hoodie.

And they made him wear this stupid gown that shows everyone his bum when they make him stand up.

His chest hurts still but it wasn't as bad anymore. _What if they gave him too many painkillers? What if he goes into a coma and doesn't wake up. What if he becomes addicted it the painkillers? What if -_

Beep

And how is he supposed to sleep with all those noises?

Okay it is actually really quite but still. The small noises that are present are all wrong. Beeping, people constantly walking softly up and down the halls and quite murmured conversations- this just makes him more anxious - its like they are trying to sneak up on people rather than just check up on them. _What if its actually not Doctors or the nurses walking around the halls but someone from the psych ward? What if the Doctors are evil and want to harvest his organs. What if- oh crap someone's coming this way._

He closes his eyes and pretends to be asleep. Eventually the person walks away.

He doesn't want them checking up on him.

It should be Patton checking up on him.

And he doesn't want nurses to explain what they have to do to him.

That should be Logic.

Logic is smart.

He probably doesn't have pneumonia at all. All these people are wrong. They should just let him go home.

Or at least have Logic here to tell them what to do.

_What if you get stuck with interns who don't know what there doing?_

That person who took his blood to run tests had to stab him four times to find a vein. Four! And he wasn't even struggling that much!

Logic could do a much better job than any of these people, but no they sent him away.

At least Logic was able to tell them what they should do and how to help him if he had a panic attack.

_What if they don't let Logic and Morality come back? What if he has to stay here alone forever?_

He doesn't want to be here.

He wants to go home.

He's lonely sick and scared.

_What if the Doctors don't let the others come back because he's contagious?_

_What if he catches some sort of super bug while he's staying here?_

_Do you think that somebody **died** in this bed before they put you here?_

_How much are the medical bills going to cost?_

_How will Princey and Thomas react when the others tell them that your here? Will- will they be worried?_

_What if the others don't want to come back?_

_What if they're happier without you?_

_The others won't want to come. Hospital visits are not proper Christmas activities. It will ruin their Christmas if they have to come and visit you._

_Seriously what if the Doctors try to harvest your organs?_

_Tomorrow they will probably make you have a sponge bath._

_No tomorrow there will be 50 first year university students visiting and they will use you for demonstration purposes of how to give someone a sponge bath._

Oh god it's too quite here. There's nothing and nobody to distract him for all his anxious thoughts.

It's Christmas time there should be carols playing on a radio or something.

Anything to distract him from his own thoughts.

He misses his own bed and bedroom and hoodie.

He misses his own family.

He should have Patton stroking his forehead telling him everything will be fine.

He should have Logan telling him not to bite the thermometer when taking his temperature.

There should be some pretty idiot running around the hallways spontaneously bursting into Christmas carols that he could listen to. _Is it so hard for someone out there just to sing a little bit of the 12 days of Christmas I mean come on! How is someone supposed to sleep around here listening to their own damn thoughts?_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I found some time and wrote something that I had no intention of writing - I swear they are going to meet up with Anxiety again soon for another big happy teary reunion.


	14. Patton needs to work for Hallmark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Princey finds handmade cards and realizes who was missing out on the festivities.

There had been the dreaded phone call to Thomas of course to tell him about the situation. He had already left to stay with his family for the holidays. It sucked that the three of them couldn't pop in with their host right now but although his nieces and nephews knew that his personalities were more or less actual people (they couldn't keep Patton from appearing and playing with the kids) the rest of his family all still believed that they were characters that Thomas made up and acted out on his YouTube channel. It would be very awkward to have someone like Aunt Patty walk in on them having this discussion.

The conversation was hard enough already. Logic had nearly started crying again because Thomas kept asking questions and while Logic knew more than any of them he was by no means an expert in pneumonia. And of course there were some questions that Logic just could not answer such as where had Anxiety got pneumonia from or how long was he going to stay in the hospital.

Princey got up and started pacing the room halfway in the conversation. He didn't have anything to add to the phone call and that just amplified his guilt that he hadn't lifted a finger to help Anxiety all week. He felt terrible as Morality and Logic described Anxiety's rapid decline over the past few days - Princey was completely unaware of Virgil's night sweats, that he was in too much pain to sit up unaided and that on his last day in the house he had completely stopped eating and drinking. Twice during the call Thomas actually asked if Princey was still there because he hadn't said anything. Princey replied that he was still in the room but really what else could he say? "Oh by the way Thomas while Patton was helping Virgil dress himself, I was off ordering from Ebay some antlers that you can attach to your car," 

As Princey was pacing he noticed something on Logic's bookshelf. There were some handmade Christmas cards. Princey was confused - they weren't the ones that he had Logic and Morality draw with him the other day.  He picked one up to have a closer look as Logic and Morality finished their phone call with Thomas. Princey felt his breath catch as he realised that this handmade card was from Anxiety to Logic.

_Anxiety went to the effort to make Logic a handmade Christmas card? I thought he didn't like doing that sort of thing. A few years back when Patton tried to make him join in with us he stormed off- he said it was stupid and a waste of paper for something a person just reads once, keeps cluttered on shelf for a few weeks and then ends up in the trash._

_Or - was it because when he sat down and picked up the black pen I said "Typical you choose the most depressive color possible, I bet your message will be something just as disheartening or mopey dopey"_

Princey looked at the card in his hands. Indeed it was monochromatic but it was still nice. 

There were the typical Christmas illustrations - bells, holly, Christmas tree, presents in black but even devoid of colour it still looked striking. The simple black highlighted the finer details of the pictures like the ribbon on the bells and presents.

The message inside Logic's card read: To Logan, I'm not good at this emotional stuff and I don't think you are either so I'll keep this simple, as a few meaningful words are better than an entire speech full of hot air: Merry Christmas. I also don't mind your company. Thanks Virgil. 

Logic and Morality had started talking again behind him but Princey wasn't listening, he put Anxiety's card back on the shelf and picked up the other one. This one was from Patton to Logic and was a complete contrast to the other. It looked like a rainbow had thrown up on the cover of the card. And the pictures on the front- god how do you even describe something like this? Creative? Unique? Potentially insane - seriously how does Patton's brain work to come up with something like this?

If Princey had to describe the front of the card to someone who couldn't see it the best he could do was this: There was Rudolph the red nose reindeer (but his nose was pink) wearing a Hawaiian shirt and green high heels. In one hand he had a purple umbrella that had a pineapple on top of it and in his other hand was a tennis racket because he was playing tennis with a Charmander who was wearing a Christmas hat and a necktie eerily similar to Logic's. The tennis ball that they were hitting was wrapped up with a bow (or maybe it wasn't a tennis ball at all but some other round present). The tennis net was made of tinsel which was a variety of different colours. They were on a beach. The Charmander was far to close to the water in Prince's opinion. For some reason there was a Christmas tree being carried away in the waves. And on top of all of this there was a UFO in the background being flown by a dog. 

Princey realised his mouth was hanging open. 

He closed it and drew in a deep breath to prepare himself for what was actually inside the card. He opened it. It took a few moments to take in the pictures that Morality had drawn inside and he wasn't prepared for it. Princey felt his eyes watering up again.

Unlike the other card this one had a long message to Logan, all of it completely sincere, heartfelt and beautiful. But it was the two pictures inside that caused Princey's guilt to sucker punch him in the stomach again. One side of the page there was a normal Christmas tree with regular ornaments. Standing around the tree were Logic, Morality and Anxiety, they each had a candy cane in their hands and were putting them on the tree. Princey wasn't with them. The Logic, Morality and Anxiety in the picture were looking at each other and smiling happily. The Morality was even holding the Anxiety's hand. 

On the opposite side of the page was the second drawing. This was of Princey. He was wearing a Santa hat and smiling but he wasn't looking at the tree or any of the others. In fact he was facing away from the first picture. He was smiling because he had his arm raised and was taking a Selfie. 

Roman didn't read what Morality had actually written in Logic's card, he quickly put it back on the shelf. He didn't want to look at it. He didn't want the visual reminder of how he had spent his past week. Those pictures weren't something made up. That had actually happened. 

Even while Anxiety was sick Morality and Logic had taken the time to make him feel included in the festivities. At some point the three of them had put the candy canes on the tree and they had probably made these cards together too. Princey thought about the smiles on Morality's drawings. 

Princey remembered when he made Logic and Morality draw cards with him how much he criticized their work - he had even torn up Patten's pictures! He remembered how Patton quietly said he hadn't had any fun when putting up the decorations. 

All week Princey had been complaining about Morality and Logic taking care of Anxiety and not participating in proper Christmas activities. But that card showed that they weren't the ones that had missed out, it was him. 

Princey turned away from the bookshelf wrapping his arms around himself as he suddenly felt quite cold. 

"Is that enough for you Princey?" 

"Huh what?" Princey asked. 

"We are ordering pizza for dinner, one pepperoni, one meatlovers and one supreme - do you think that will be enough for us to share?" asked Logic.

"Um yeah, th-that's fine whatever," muttered Princey.

After Logic placed the call there was an awkward silence nobody was quite sure what to do. 

"Um I think - if we want to eat in the lounge - I might start tidying up the mess I made in there," said Patton sheepishly. 

The others blinked - it seemed like an eternity had passed since Morality had destroyed the living room. 


	15. Bag of beautiful things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sides are packing a bag to take to visit Virgil in the hospital.

There was a bag sitting on the coffee table. Morality and Logic were staring at it brainstorming. Princey was sitting off quietly at the base of the stairs, lost in thought. 

The bag was going to be filled with comforting gifts to give to Virgil, as his hospital admission was quite sudden he only had the clothes on his back with him. 

And the hospital staff were adamant that he could not wear his black hoodie while he was in bed. 

"So following that logic, don't you think the staff will also  _not_ let him wear this one in bed as well?" questioned Logic.

"Well we will sneak it in and Virgil can hide it and wear it when no one is looking." explained Morality, holding up the awesome black and purple hoodie that he found in Virgil's room. "This is  _so_ cool, he should mix up his style when he comes home and wear this occasionally instead of the black one all the time."

"I do agree that is a um - a jacket." said Logic unable to accurately describe the sheer attractiveness of the fashionable garment. 

Morality folded up the jacket and put it in the bag. 

"Okay so I am giving him my Alice in Wonderland puzzle book." said Logic "As well as some reading materials, from my own book collection: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd and Murder on the Orient Express - because it is a classic. And I have gone into Anxiety's room and found some of his own books to bring him; A is for Armageddon, A Semi-Definitive List of Worst Nightmares and Quiet Influence; The Introvert's Guide to Making a Difference." 

"Um... can I add in a book too? From my room, maybe something a bit more cheerful?" asked Patton.

"Certainly, what do you want to add?"

"Winnie the Pooh!"

"Very well. Now what else to add?"

"Some candy canes?"

"Yes, acceptable."

"The cookie jar!"

"Um not acceptable - well not the whole jar itself. We can take some cookies out and put them in a plastic zip lock bag for him."

"Colouring books and pens, pencils and crayons - oh we still have some of those special Halloween crayon packs!"

"Yes, acceptable."

"His hairbrush and toothbrush and a face washer. And his eyeshadows."

"Yes, acceptable"

"Ballons!" and Patton waved his hands and the room filled with brightly coloured balloons bobbing off the ceiling.

"Not acceptable - there are too many, we can take one."

"You can't make a rainbow with only one colour!"

Logic sighed. "Two then Patton, just two and that's final - the staff will not allow an entire roomful of balloons."

Patton pouted. 

"Um maybe a nightlight or small torch," suggested Patton "You know in case it's too dark."

"Yes acceptable, I believe I have a pen light in one of my stationary sets."

"Princey's sword."

"What? _NO._ That is completely unacceptable. Patton why would you even suggest such a thing?" 

"So he can defend himself."

"From what exactly?" 

"Um you know, monsters or ghosts of people who died at the hospital. Or even evil Doctors trying to steal his kidneys."

"What morbid and ridiculous ideas. None of those will ever happen to Virgil. And I forbid you from even mentioning them to him. The last thing he needs is unhealthy thoughts like those." 

The two sides then looked over to Princey who was still sitting at the base of the stairs. He didn't look like his bright cheerful confident self. He hadn't had a very good nights sleep. Which was unusual for the fanciful side because of his dream manipulation he could always give himself pleasant dreams. However last night he had willed his dreams to replay his memories of all his interactions with Anxiety over the past three weeks. He was just so desperate; he couldn't see or talk to Anxiety now so he wanted to relive the times that Virgil was there.

It had been a terrible idea.  In his dreams/memories Princey was forced to stand off to the side and watch his past self treat Virgil like dirt. The sides in his dreams couldn't hear him, he couldn't alter what happened, he couldn't stop his past self acting like a jerk and he couldn't help the dream/past Anxiety. 

 _Someone like you couldn't possibly understand how important this is. I am just trying to protect the festive season from you._   ** _No, I'm sorry, that isn't what's important!_**

_As the dream Anxiety runs out the present Princey watching in the dream is able to chase him to the door, begging him to stop but after he passes the threshold everything becomes blurry because Princey never actually when after him._ _**Please, he calls out into the darkness, Come back!**_

**_~~~_ **

_"when we're having so much fun together -" "No. I don't. You-you've never invited me to come with you before,"_   ** _I-I don't know why I never asked you to come before. But I will. I promise. We can all go toge-_**

_Don't try blaming us_ _**Oh will you shut up me!**_

_**~~~~** _

Yes it had been a terrible night's sleep. 

"Princey?"

Roman jumped as Logic gently placed his hand on his shoulder. 

"Sorry I was lost in thought - again." he said lamely. 

"Is there anything you want to take to the hospital for Virgil?"

Princey's chest tightened. He was finally going to get to see Anxiety again. He could make amends for his behaviour. So why did he feel so panicked. 

"Um I -I." he stuttered trying to think of something he could take to Virgil. "I... don't know."

"Oh"

"I mean I don't know what to give him! I want to give him something of course. But what? It should be something amazing, a grand gesture to make up for everything-"

"It doesn't have to be anything over the top. Just something small but heartfelt that he would enjoy while he has to stay there. Something personal so he can be reminded of you when he looks at it."

"Um - maybe my sword-"

" _No_ you halfwit, think of something appropriate for a hospital room! Like a soft toy or something."

Princey gasped. "What about this?"

He summoned into his hands an adorable little bunny rabbit toy that was wearing in a green dress with a love heart pocket at the front that held another cute little bunny in it. 

Patton squealed when he saw it and came running over to play with it. 

"Oh she is so  _cute_. What's her name?"

"Ms. Fluffy Bottom."

"Yes this is an acceptable item for Virgil. Is there anything else you want to bring?" asked Logic. 

Princey thought again for another minute. He had an idea but he wasn't sure if Anxiety would like it - actually he wasn't sure if Anxiety wouldn't flat out hate it. 

Princey summoned something else into his closed hands and turned to the others, "I don't know if this is a good idea and it's not even an original idea - Morality suggested it a few days ago but-" he said nervously as he uncurled his fingers and held out his hands to show the others bottles of brightly coloured nail polishes. There were the bright green and red that his own nails were painted in but also black, silver and deep purples that matched the jacket that Morality had found. 

Logic brought a hand up to adjust his glasses, "An interesting idea, although I cannot say how it well it will be received."

"It's a lovely idea." exclaimed Morality jumping up and down. 

~~~

Everything had been packed into the bag (and a black and purple balloon had been tied to the handle) and they were ready to depart to visit Virgil in the hospital. 

Princey felt like he was suffocating. 

He didn't know why!

By the time they were walking down the garden path to the car he had started to hyperventilate and dropped to his knees gasping for air. 

"Roman - Roman what's wrong? Talk to us." cried Morality. 

"I - I can't"

"Can't what?"

"I can't go."

"What?"

"I ju-just can't go. I can't face him. Not after how I've behaved and everything I've done to him! What am I even going to say to him?"

"You just go and you talk to him. Be honest. Tell him how you feel. That's what you're going to say to him."

Roman let out broken sobs. 

"What if -sob- what if he doesn't  _want_ me there? He-he must hate me. I can't just walk in there and say "How are you feeling today?" and expect everything to be cool -sob- how do I even start to make up for everything?"

"You start to make up for everything by  _starting._ We don't know how Anxiety feels or will react but you can't make amends if you don't try. And-and maybe Anxiety won't "be cool" but you have to try and then if this is really important to you, you will keep trying."

"I'm really scared." said Princey wiping this eyes on the sleeve of his Christmas jumper, "I'm scared he won't forgive me."

"Roman being scared shows that you care. And that -that's a beautiful thing Roman. You care and you value the outcome of the situation. You want to make things up to Anxiety. Please don't make the assumption that it's too late to do that. Please don't let being scared stop you. Try. Just try. And you have both of us here too, we will help you talk to Virgil we're a family we will get through this."

Roman took a deep breath and let the others guide him into the car. Soon he would see Virgil. Soon. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I started this fic Anxiety had a black hoodie now he has a purple hoodie, my has time gone by.


	16. Hospital Visit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Princey finally gets to visit Anxiety.

Princey swallowed nervously. 

The hallway was coming to an end and they were almost at Virgil's room. 

Princey's legs felt like jelly that had been put in a washing machine on spin cycle. He kept his eyes fixated on those two bobbing balloons in front of him that Patton had attached to the bag. 

This was it, they were standing in the doorway. The others went in ahead of him. 

Patton went in first letting out a delighted squeal which Logic immediately shushed him for.

"Hey my wonderful black pudding son, you look _so_ much better!" he said grabbing a chair and pulling it around to the other side of the bed, he placed the bag on the floor as Anxiety stared longingly at the balloons. Logic grabbed two more chairs and took a seat on one, leaving the other free for Princey.

Princey remained standing awkwardly in the doorway rooted to the spot. He could not believe that Morality could blurt out a blatant lie like that. 

"Indeed it seems your stay has made a remarkable improvement on your health." commented Logic. 

 _What?_ thought Princey gob smacked. The others started a quite conversation with Virgil who kept turning his head either side of his bed to talk to them. Princey wasn't listening. He was in shock. 

This,  _this_ was better? _This_ was a remarkable improvement?!? Virgil looked like - he looked like absolute _shit._

Anxiety was pale, too pale. This was not his usual white from his foundation - he wasn't wearing any make up! His skin was shrunken against his face like a pasty white corpse, the dark bags under his eyes were a sickening shade of black and purple like someone had given him a black eye and it screamed insomniac - did he normally wear eyeshadow to try and hide this? His lips were dry and cracked. Without his usual hoodie Princey could see how skinny and frail the other was. The jacket had given the illusion of some sort of bulk on his frame, the thin bedsheets showed a torso that could be blown over in a slight breeze. His bangs hung limp and unkempt over his forehead. 

Then-then there were the tubes. The signs of medical intervention that were helping to save his life. They made him look so helpless and well- sick. A breathing apparatus that ran uncomfortably up both his nostrils. A drip stuck into his forearm, something else stuck into the top of his  _h_ _and_ on his other arm, with a bandage taped over the top (how deep was that? that had to hurt.) and there was another tube running out from under the bedsheets around his waist connected to a bag hanging on the side of the bed, it had yellow liquid in it. 

Morality tried to pick up the bag, "What's this?" he asked curiously, tugging it.

"AH, Morality please don't touch that," cried Virgil and Logic at the same time. 

"Oh Virgil look who's come to visit." Morality said excitedly letting go of the bag and pointing at Princey. 

 Logic leaned back in his chair so Anxiety could have a clear view of Princey. Was-was he not strong enough to lean forward to look on his own?

Anxiety's eyes met Princey's. They filled with something that Princey had never seen or never noticed the other side have before. Princey couldn't pinpoint what emotion they held - joy, relief, hope? Something. Something positive. Something sweet and pure. That kind of look was something that Morality would give them. The emotion in those eyes was something that Princey knew he did not deserve directed at him.  Guilt sucker punched him again. 

Princey did not know what kind of look he had on his face. Everyone was looking at him now. He felt numb. 

Anxiety gave Princey a small trademark smirk and said quietly "Hey Princey."

Princey felt his mouth go dry and it seemed that his tongue had grown twice its regular size.

 _Say something,_ his mind screamed at him. The others continued to look at him expectantly. Anxiety's eyes started to fill with uncertainty.

"S-sorry you had to be dragged here today," he said quietly. It was heartbreaking. 

Princey tried to say something but his mouth just made a weird noise something between a gargle and a hiccup. Morality quickly grabbed Anxiety's arm.

"No, no Virgil. Roman wanted to come today, he's really missed you - haven't you Roman?" 

"... really?" asked Anxiety. 

 _Yes,_ Roman wanted to say,  _Of course I've missed you. Oh my god, I thought I lost you. Don't you ever fricking scare me like that again! You're so important Virgil, to Thomas, to all of us and especially to me. I'm so sorry for how I behaved this past week. I'm sorry for how I behaved towards you in general. I've been an arse - a completely selfish egocentric stuck up arse. And I'm sorry. Please, please forgive me. Please give me a second chance to prove to you that I care about you - because I do! Virgil you are -you are my family. I love you._

This is what Roman wanted to say but instead he blurted out:

"You look like bleached roadkill." 

The "something" vanished from Anxiety's eyes as he gave a defeated sigh letting his shoulders sag and his mouth dropped in a disbelieving Oh My God Did He Really Just Say That Why Do I Even Bother? © trademark frown. 

"Oh  _Roman_ why? That's not nice." cried Morality in distress. 

Logic just groaned and brought a hand up to pinch the middle of his nose where his glasses sat. He might have muttered "idiot" quietly.

Princey suddenly rushed forward knocking the chair aside and dived  _onto_ Anxiety who gave a pained cry when Princey's forehead collided quite harshly against his diaphragm. 

"Pl-please le-let me do your nails!" sobbed Princey who started crying in earnest as he squeezed the life out of Anxiety. 

"wha-?" cried Anxiety gasping in pain.

What the hell is he doing, what is going on? thought Anxiety as he struggled to reach the attention button to call a nurse. Help need an adult, I'm dying, he's suffocating me with a weird head-butt and hug attack. He's going to break my ribs, he's going to crush me with his body weight. Need an adult need an adult need an adult!

"Oh my god - Roman seriously has love or whatever emotion you're feeling right now made you go COMPLETLEY INSANE!" shouted Logic. 

"Ah Roman you have to be gentle with him!" exclaimed Morality trying to ease Roman off of Virgil but unfortunately in the process knocked the bag on the floor.

The bag burst open. 

Out poured all of the balloons that Logic told Morality to leave behind. Plus give or take 50 more. They filled up the small room in an instant and then trailed out the open door into the hallway. 

"Oops"

" _Patton I told you not to bring-"_

"Woof woof!"

" ** _Patton what is that?!"_** growled Logan angrily. 

"Um... you said nothing about  _not_   bringing a dog!" 

Virgil finally in anguish had reached and pressed repeatedly his call for assistance button. However by now this was completely unnecessary. Several staff members had followed the endless trail of balloons leading out from their room. 

"Excuse me just what is going on in-" exclaimed a stern looking woman in a nurses uniform just as a very large excited golden Labrador decided that she looked like someone who needed their uniform covered in dog slobber and paw prints. 

"HOW DID YOU BRING A DOG IN HERE?!?" 

"um... it's a seeing eye dog?"

"VIRGIL I AM SO SORRY. I LOVE YOU. AFTER I HAVE DONE YOUR NAILS CAN I STYLE YOUR HAIR?"


	17. Nails

Virgil's heart thumped loudly in his chest, he was surprised that none of the others heard it.

Calm down, he thought to himself, just freaking calm down. This is not a big deal. Stop thinking this is a big deal! So you're holding hands. Big deal people do it all the time. In fact you done it before. Technically he's not even holding your hand. He's just steading it so he can put the nail polish on. Because you're making this a big deal and your hand is shaking and he has to hold onto it. 

If this was proper hand holding he would be screaming like he did last time. So it's not hand holding. So there is no reason for your heart to race, your stomach to have butterflies and you to have shortness of breath. Well except if the shortness of breath is a relapse of the pneumonia. ... Oh god what if it is a relapse? You're gonna die and-

"Virgil are you okay?" asked Logic staring at him intently from his spot on the couch across the room, interrupting Anxiety's thoughts. 

"Huh. Yeah I'm fine," said Anxiety swallowing trying to steady his breathing. 

Princey immediately looked up from his work. 

"You sure? You don't have to - I can stop this, if you don't want-" Princey started babbling. 

"No. I'm fine I swear. Don't start having kittens over me Romano." teased Anxiety. Princey frowned at the nickname. 

"Besides it would look stupid if you stopped now, you've already done half of them." 

"Well - I could clean it off. If you don't like this just say and-" 

"I said it's fine." insisted Anxiety holding his hand up for Princey to continue. 

Princey went back to his work a look of intense concentration filled his handsome features and he gently held Anxiety's hand steady and resumed applying the bright red nail polish. 

He was determined to make this his best work. No smudges or streaks or bits of paint overflowing from the nail onto the skin. It had to be perfect. 

Anxiety gave a small smile as he watched the perfectionist move from one nail to the next, blowing slightly on each nail as it was finished. He was intentionally painting every second nail, when he was finished with the red Princey would switch with Morality and paint the rest green. 

Another plus from agreeing to do this (apart from holding Roman's hand. Which wasn't really hand holding. Okay maybe it was -whatever), was that they had also managed to peer pressure Logic into doing this as well. 

Princey's nails were done. Anxiety agreed to let Princey do his nails. Morality just declared that he was going to paint his nails too. And if Anxiety was letting Princey do his nails, then obviously Logic was going to let Morality paint his, stated Morality in a matter of fact way. Morality didn't understand why he had to explain that logic to Logic - it was so obvious. Everyone was getting a manicure!

So while Princey painted in one color, Morality painted in the other much to Logic's dismay. Morality was a little too heavy handed with the polish. A bit too much was used and dripping everywhere. Princey whispered quietly into Logic's ear that he would fix it up later when Morality was done. 

Finally all their nails were done and they were patiently waiting for them to dry, Princey biting his lip trying not to criticize Patton's work on Logan's nails, "It looks so ... wonderful Patton ... and wet, um I think we might need to get my hair dryer." and Princey quickly dashed upstairs. 

Morality came over to look at Anxiety's nails holding them up into the light. 

"Wow Virgil they look amazing Princey really did a good job, I think he made them look even better than his." 

"Thanks Patton." said Virgil trying to ignore the fact that Morality had both of his hands in his and his heart wasn't thumping like a jack hammer. Don't over think, it doesn't mean anything, Anxiety desperately tried to convince himself as Princey came back into the room. 

"Okay you know what happens now?" asked Morality beaming around at them all. The others shrugged. 

"TOES!" cried Morality diving for Logic's feet pulling off his shoes and socks ignoring the others protests who tried to pull his feet away. 

"Now Logic if you don't cooperate I'm going to have to tickle you." he threatened and not waiting for a reply commenced and all out tickle attack causing Logic to thrash and shriek loudly. 

"You know I think that the hospital released me earlier than they should have because they just couldn't handle the shenanigans that you three got into every time you visited me." said Anxiety.

"Pfft nonsense; the children's ward loved seeing a new dog Patton smuggled in for each visit, and those cupcakes were better than any of the food they served you even if they exploded glitter and changing all hospital gowns to onesie just made plain fashion sense and-" listed Princey. 

"Princey he's escaping - grab him!"

Princey dived onto Logic and mercilessly started tickling too. 

Anxiety sat on the couch trying to suppress his laughter. It still hurt his ribs to laugh too hard. 

But he figured to die laughing with the three wouldn't be a bad way to go. 

 


	18. Early Gift

The sides were sitting around the living room simply enjoying the quiet of each others company. Sipping cups of hot chocolate and eggnog peacefully. Sharing small smiles with each other after each sip. This was the quiet before the storm. There was no other way to put it, because tomorrow was Christmas and Patton would turn into something akin to the force of 17 kindergarteners on red cordial and a hurricane. 

Even now Patton was the most animated of any of them, bouncing his legs up and down excitedly on the couch clutching his drink with both hands so he didn't accidently spill it. They were trying to wind down so that they could have a good nights sleep. Patton eyed off the presents greedily. In the end they did get a new Christmas tree to replace the old one he had destroyed. However they didn't replace the decorations that he had ruined. But it actually looked lovely. 

A lot more greenery poked out from behind the remaining sparkle and glimmer of ornaments and tinsel. The scene looked more natural. More alive. Thomas's bright blue bauble shone brightly and proudly right in the middle of the tree. 

The pile of presents wasn't as large either. Not all of the gifts that Patton had kicked could be salvaged but Princey hadn't gone out and bought replacements for the ones that he had bought for himself that were wrecked. 

Anxiety was sitting on the carpet. One because he liked sitting on things that weren't chairs and two because from here he could look up at the tree. It made him feel like a small child again bringing back a sense of wonder. It had been years since he had been able to simply enjoy just looking at the tree and decorations. He had spent so much time hiding in his room, worried of what the others would say if they caught him looking at their tree. 

He sighed with content and leaned back against the side of the couch. Everything was so pretty to look at. He picked up his drink and took another sip. As he put it down he made eye contact with Princey who was across the room. Everything so pretty to lo- nope, nope, nope. Anxiety quickly glanced away, fiddling with the hood of his jacket.

Princey was fidgety too. From where he was sitting he didn't have the best view of the tree but could watch Logan, Virgil and Patton. And to him that was what was important now. He knew a few weeks ago that would have been different. He would have been standing in front of the tree basking in its glory probably adjusting something or trying to add more things to it, not caring if the others could see or not. Now he cared about the people he was with not the "things" he had. 

But. Well. There was one more thing he wanted to put on the tree. But he wasn't sure if he should leave it until tomorrow morning or not. It was a present. So he should probably wait. But it was something that went on the tree. So if he waited for morning there would be less time for it to be of use. But if he got the others to open a gift now could they physically stop Morality from opening all the others? 

As Princey chewed his lip debating what he should do, Morality stood up and walked towards the tree. 

"Patton." warned Logic.

"What Logan? I'm just getting another candy cane." said Morality innocently, plucking one from the branches. 

"Hmm. That is the last one then." said Logic. Logic had caught Patton several times trying to touch and feel his gifts, shaking them, squeezing them, even trying to peak through the folded parts of the wrapping paper. Even now as Morality kneeled down next to the tree taking a candy cane from the lower branches with one hand, the other hand stealthily moved over a box giving it a gentle shake.

Logic frowned but let it go as Patton came back to his seat already tearing the plastic off his sweet treat. Honestly the holiday seasons were the worse. Logic found everything so stressful, because everyone else got so stressed and emotional. Even though it was a great time for making extensive lists and plans - it became even more stressful because nobody ever stuck to those lists and plans. And this Christmas Logic didn't think he had ever felt more stressed and worried in his entire life, as he glanced over at Virgil. 

That scare with pneumonia. That had been so frightening. But. Right now everything was okay. Virgil was with them safe and sound. And after coming home from the hospital he had been spending more and more time with everybody. Even Roman's attitude had done a complete 180 degrees. Was  _this_ what all the Christmas songs and stories were talking about - the real spirit of Christmas? He would have to do a thorough analysis later. Logan went to take another sip of his drink and caught sight of his nails. Oh and I thought purple pigmented hair was a nuisance, he thought sighing into his drink.

Roman made up his mind. He stood up walked over to the presents and picked one up and cleared his throat. Morality eyes went wide and became razor focused on that present.

"I-I know its early but I would really like to give you this now." stammered Roman.

Morality squealed, clapping his hands excitedly. "I get a GIFT!"

Princey held the present up high above his head out of Patton's reach as he lunged for the box. Patton's face crumpled with disappointment as he stood on tiptoe to try and get it. Being the same height made it hard to kept things away from others. 

"Patton, it's not just for you! This is a gift for all three of you. So share. _Share_!" said Princey. 

"Oh okay, okay, I can share, but let me open it. Please. Please. PLEASE." cried Patton, as Virgil and Logan moved over to them. 

"Now we will never get him to sleep." muttered Logic to himself. 

Patton tore away the colourful paper to reveal a box. He gasped as he looked inside. The front of it was made of clear plastic. Inside it was separated into four sections each containing a coloured bauble with writing on it. Patton opened the box quickly (but carefully) and pulled out the different bauble and passed them around. 

There was a dark blue with elegant silver cursive writing that said Logan on one. A bright silver one with Patton on another, each letter was written in a different colour so the name looked like a rainbow. And there was a gorgeous purple one with thick black writing saying Virgil on the next one, it looked so edgy and cool.

"I wanted you to have these now so we could put them on the tree because soon Christmas will be over and you won't get to use them again until next year." said Princey.

Logan and Virgil smiled. They loved the gift.

"Thank you Roman." said Logan quietly.   

"There-it's, well literally I can't think of anything bitter or cynical to remark." said Virgil. 

"That is possibly the highest praise I can imagine you giving me Virgil." said Roman. 

But Patton was frowning. Inside the box there were four baubles. He held up the last one. He had expected it to say "Roman" or "Princey" since there were obviously one for each of them, but it didn't. 

"Um Princey what's the deal with this one?" he asked. 

"Oh well, you see there was a special if you got four you see, so I - you know that one's just a bit of a reminder for myself, it's not import-" babbled Princey trying to take the last one away but Patton held it out of his reach. 

On the last one instead of "Roman" or "Princey" it had instead (written smaller than the others so it would fit): Remember Prat. 

"Why would you get that written for yourself?" demanded Patton sounding upset as he showed the others the message which they also frowned at.

"You sound just like the shop assistant." remarked Princey trying to laugh it off. But the others looked at him waiting for a proper explanation.

Roman looked at the ground nervously, he should have taken that one out of the box before giving it to them. He swallowed and launched into his explanation.

"Well I asked to have that written specially for a reminder for myself. To remember to not be a prat. To remember that Christmas is not about getting gifts, or having the best decorations or any of that junk. That you guys and Thomas are what is really important. And having this bauble on the tree with -that- message will serve as a constant reminder of the time that I acted like a prat and nearly forgot and almost lost what was actually important to me." said Roman still looking at his feet.

The others looked at how somber and sincere he was. Roman looked like he was about to start crying. Patton pulled him in for a hug. 

"Oh Roman you don't have to beat yourself up about all that anymore, its over in the past now, we know you won't ever act like that again." said Patton. 

"It's true, we forgive you. You don't have to have something like this. It would be like trying to rub salt into an old wound having this on the tree." said Logan. 

Roman glanced over at Virgil to see what he thought. 

Virgil took the decoration from Patton's hands and held it tightly. Suddenly the letters on the bauble started to shift and move, swirling and swirling around so fast that they couldn't be seen anymore, the ball itself started to glow, brighter and brighter in Virgil's hands. Then suddenly it stopped. Virgil held it up for Roman to see. It was now a bright pink color and it said: Roman <3 Family. 

Virgil put it on the tree next to Thomas's childhood bauble. 

There were no other pink ornaments on the tree. 

It looked perfect. 


	19. Princey's Beauty Sleep Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> WHAT THIS IS STILL GOING THE AUTHOR STOPPED BEING LAZY AND UPDATED - WHAT IS GOING ON!?!?

All too soon Logan announced bedtime much to Patton's disappointment (he wasn't at all tired) and excitement (soon it would be Christmas morning!!!).  As they started heading upstairs Roman called Virgil back.

"Psst Virgil come here." waving the other over quietly so not to alert the others.

Virgil walked over to him quickly glancing at the ceiling and felt his stomach drop slightly with disappointment and then started mentally kicking himself.

Oh god; You did not just look to see if he was standing under mistletoe and then get disappointed that he wasn't, what the hell is wrong with you? 

"Virgil... did you hear me?" asked Princey 

"Wha - um no s-sorry, um I must be too tired, what did you say?" stammered Virgil. 

"I asked if you have any more of those candy canes left?" repeated Princey.

"Yeah, I have about half a bag left. Why?"

"Can you get them? I have an idea to keep Patton from waking us up too early; every year my poor beauty sleep suffers so on this day."

"What on earth do you think can stop  _Patton_ from waking the three of us up at an ungodly hour on Christmas so we can sleep in?"

"No - I did not say "the three of us" for my plan to work Logic, er will have to be a ... sacrificial pawn so to speak." 

"Okay... I'm interested." 

 

~~~~

Later. Christmas morning (technically) 

 

Patton awoke with a start sitting bolt upright in his bed. It was Christmas morning.

IT WAS CHRISTMAS MORNING!

He squealed with delight. Bopping up and down in his bed. 

It was Christmas! Presents and food and carols and presents and hugs and more food and family and more presents and love and everything would be so sweet and pure and presents and I have to wake the others up right now!

Patton looked around for his glasses which despite being on his bedside table were hard to find because it was still dark. Finally he found them and shoved them on and started feeling around for his phone. 

After he found that he flipped it on and blinded himself -Augh! But as he sat there blinking he registered that his phone had the time listed as 2.07am. 

It was morning! He needed to get up and wake the others right now! Now Logic may have said that he must not get up and wake them until at least 5.30am but he was too excited to remember that because it was Christmas morning! Some Christmas's he would also forget to put on pants.

He leaped from bed and - Crack!

"Yikes!" shrieked Patton jumping back onto his bed. He had stood on something that made a loud crack noise under his feet. Carefully he felt around and turned on his bedside lamp to see what it was. 

It was a candy cane. But it was broken now. But that was okay because there was a trail of candy canes leading up to his closed bedroom door. There was a note underneath the first now broken one. HOW EXICTING. 

Patton quickly picked up the note and unfolded it. It looked like it had been written by two different people; there was one handwriting that an elegant cursive writing done in blue pen and another done in a black Sharpie. 

 _Dearest Patton Sanders._ (This part was in the blue pen)

_Have you been a good boy this year? Oh that is good to hear. But remember good boys wait until Christmas morning to open their presents and wake up their friends._

(Black sharpie insert:) _MORNING = SUN IS UP._

_So if you have woken up and it is not morning yet but you can't get back to sleep follow this special trail of candy canes to a special surprise for you Patton._

Patton gasped with excitement: he was going to get a surprise!

Quickly climbing out of bed he grabbed his cat hoodie because it had a front pocket he could put the candy canes in, he got on his hands and knees and started crawling to collect the candy canes. He opened his door and nearly screamed with joy when he saw that the trail of candy canes went down the hall - so many!

They stopped in front of Logic's room. But there was another note under the candy cane there.

(Blue pen): _Trail continues inside._

(Black pen): _DON'T KNOCK._

(Blue pen): _Yes do not knock, be very quite._

Patton opened the door very quietly so not to wake up Logic and crawled inside, there were more candy canes leading all the way up to Logic's bed. There was one final note.

(Blue pen): _Well done Patton! Now your surprise is this; YOU get to help Santa this year. Logic sent a letter to Santa this year along with all the other boys and girls in the world and Santa always makes sure good boys and girls get what they ask for on their wish lists they send to Santa. Guess what Logic wished for? Well I'll tell you. Logic Sanders's number one wish for Christmas -_

(Black pen): _Even more than a telescope._

(Blue pen): _was for a big, long cuddle from Patton Sanders - that's you! So please Patton help Logan Sanders's Christmas wish come true. I want you to climb into Logan's bed very quietly and give him a nice gentle hug until Christmas morning._

(Black pen): _MORNING = WHEN THE SUN IS UP!_

(Blue pen): _Try not to wake him up. BUT if he does wake up, you still have to give him his wish, so just get into his bed and hold onto him and refuse to leave - maybe even pretend you are sleep walking and hold him and fake snore until he gives up and lies down with you._

(Black pen): _DON'T SHOW HIM THESE NOTES._

(Blue pen): _Yes don't show him these notes -ever. Eat them with the candy canes if you have to.  Merry Christmas Love Santa._   


	20. The Gift and the First Kiss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is some confusion about Prinxiety's first kiss.

 Eventually Thomas found out that they were dating. Much to Anxiety's dismay. It came about when they were discussing making another Valentines day video. 

"What did you say?" asked Thomas not believing his ears. 

"Anxiety and Princey are dating. Prinxiety is a thing." beamed Patton. 

"What?"

"Yep." 

Thomas and Patton looked at each other. You could literally feel their excitement bubbling up inside them. 

Thomas quickly looked around at the others to confirm this. Logan was trying to look uninterested but was hiding a small smirk behind his hand. Roman just beamed his chest puffed out proudly a faint pink blush rising on his cheeks. And Virgil. 

Well he had hunched himself up crossing his arms with his hoodie pulled up for protection, eyes fixed firmly on the ground to avoid eye contact with everyone. 

OMG it's true, thought Thomas. 

Looking back at Patton they both started jumping up and down screaming "EEEKKK THEY'RE DATING! THEY'RE DATING! PRINXIETY IS A THING!" - it was hard to believe that Patton already knew all this already, he was that excited about it, it was like he was hearing it for the first time. 

"Virgil is still a bit shy and embarrassed about all this." said Patton calming down a bit (meaning he needed to catch his breath) "It's okay Virgil - being in love is the best! And you two make the cutest couple. Oh Thomas you should see how adorable it is when Virgil holds Roman's hand and-"

" _DAD SHHH!_ " hissed Virgil. 

Logan's smirk became larger and Patton just giggled. 

"Aw come on kiddo I'm just so thrilled for you." 

"Thomas doesn't need to know any details."

"I strongly disagree. Thomas absolutely needs to know all the details. Right now." demanded Thomas. "I-I just can't believe this is happening and that you guys have kept it from me - how-how did this happen, and when and who made the first move and-and -and OH! Have you kissed yet? Please tell me you have kissed. Patton! Roman! Tell me has there been K-I-S-S-I-N-G? Thomas clapped in time with each of the letters he spelt out. 

 Virgil groaned and rolled his eyes. 

Roman blushed harder but his smile lit up his eyes, "Of course there has been Thomas. Actually I'm surprised you didn't pick up on this sooner, I mean there were are few times that, even with Virgil slathering on the foundation, the hickeys on his neck were clear as day."

" _Roman!_ " hissed Virgil as Thomas and Patton burst into school girl giggles. 

"Okay, Okay." gasped Thomas waving his hands about "Tell me about your _first_ kiss!"

Roman launched into a story (dramatically) about mistletoe, a blushing shy Virgil and how sweet and pure it was and-

Logan interrupted by loudly clearing his throat. "That wasn't your first kiss." 

"Excuse?" demands Princey genuinely confused and indignant - how was the mistletoe _not_ their first kiss. What would Logan know about their first kiss-

Virgil blushing furiously at the topic of conversation muttered "He's right."

Roman looked gobsmacked - wha- how could he not remember whatever kiss they were talking about. 

"You-you remember Christmas morning?" asked Virgil.

"Thanks to somebody's certain notes, _I_ certainly remember Christmas morning, being woken up much earlier than you two." muttered Logan. 

"Well later than that - the presents." said Virgil shifting on his feet nervously. 

Roman raised his eyes to the ceiling trying to think back to the presents - it was a fantastic Christmas morning. For once he was not woken at an ungodly hour by Patton. But the presents - well there weren't as many as there normally were for him but that was okay because he was just happy being with his family. But he doesn't remember Virgil kissing him.

"I-I'm sorry my love, I cannot recall you kissing me-" apologized Roman. 

Patton snorted. "Silly Roman - _you_ kissed Virgil."

"Yes I thought you might have traumatised him to be honest." said Logan. "You were very forceful."

Roman blinked and bunched is knuckles in front of his mouth, thinking: _He kissed Virgil?_

"He honesty doesn't remember!" exclaimed Logan.

"Well he was very excited." reasoned Patton. 

Virgil sighed, "When you opened my present..." 

That crucial bit of information brought something back. Roman remembered: Christmas morning, Virgil's presents, he was fretting and worried because he hadn't given the three of them presents before, and because he was sick he hadn't been able to go out and buy them anything good he said, and he was sorry that the presents weren't new and they probably wouldn't like them anyway- the three of them had to cut him off and stop his self deprecating spiel. Patton had told Virgil that they would love his presents no matter what they were. 

Nervously Virgil handed Roman a long cylindrical lightweight gift, "Be careful you don't tear it with the wrapping." he muttered.

Roman opened his present. 

And then screamed. 

"AAAHH REALLY? I CAN REALLY HAVE THEM? YOUR SICK NASTY TIM BURTON POSTERS REALLY? OH VIRGIL THANK YOU, YOU ARE THE BEST."

And then he jumped onto Virgil crushing him into a bear hug. 

But Roman was too excited and didn't stop there. He grabbed Virgil's face with both hands and kissed him full on the mouth. For quite sometime.

"MWAH! OH VIRGIL I LOVE THEM! I LOVE YOU! WHOOPEE!" Roman had released Virgil who collapsed on the floor and curled up into a fetus position his face aflame, as Roman grabbed the posters and started dancing around the room waving Jack and Sally around with delight. 

Roman's happy dance lasted several minutes while Patton and Logan sat next to shell shocked Virgil trying to get a response from him. 

"Is he dead?" whispered Patton poking Anxiety in the side. 

"No just embarrassed or panicking - possibly he is touched starved - but I think he will be okay though Patton." said Logan. 

"Oh good." smiled Patton. "Because I made way too much Christmas food for only three people to eat."  


	21. Technically Second Kiss

_Ow, wha- ouch! Stop that. What are you doing?_

_Oh – you want me to write a chapter about the kissing story Roman was going to tell, about the mistletoe eh?_

_Well you didn’t have to twist my arm so hard you know._

_What’s that? Needed to get my attention because it was taking too long? Well – okay I guess you’re right – but come on, I would have gotten there eventually._

_Okay here we go_ : The kiss that was not actually their first kiss but Roman thought it was because he forgot about the one he gave Virgil on Christmas morning because he was so excited story.

First you have to understand something. Although Princey is supposed to be the romantic one, it was Patton who first realized that Virgil had developed a crush on the Prince.

Problem was Anxiety was doing nothing – and I mean NOTHING, to act upon this new crush. All he was doing was looking at Roman a bit more. You know the fond wistful stares from across the room. His eyes being drawn to the royal whenever he entered the room, his face lighting up just slightly, nowhere near obvious enough for Roman to see how smitten Virgil had become. Roman was accustomed to preforming **grand** romantic gestures – so he couldn’t notice Virgil’s small gesture of making eyes at him.

The fact that Roman was still feeling guilty for how he treated Anxiety over the Christmas time meant Roman was being much more friendlier with Virgil – not groaning at the sight of him in the commons anymore, or interrupting him when he started to say something, or throwing out hurtful insults or flat out ignoring him anymore. Because of this there were less fights and awkwardness and tension in the Sanders household, everyone was calmer and happier (even Patton and Logan) and all four of them were becoming friends and a stronger family. But Patton could see that Anxiety didn’t want to be _just_ friends with Princey. He wanted something more.

Patton was going to help his son get that more!

So, Patton started helping Virgil get closer to Roman – er literally. For example, when he was setting the table he would put the plates for them close together. Like the two plates were actually touching each other – to eat from it you would have to move your chair and be pressed up next to the person.

His first attempt at this method didn’t work out so well because Roman and Logan sat on the same side. Patton ran over to the side of the table and grabbed Logan under the arm pits and forcefully pulled him up out of the chair.

“No Logan you can’t sit there you have to sit next to me!” Then when Anxiety and Princey sat back down – it was obvious the plates were too close together to eat properly without knocking each others elbows so the moved the plates away from each.

“NO stop that, keep the plates where they are!”

 “Patton, we can’t eat this close together.”

“Yes, you can and you should it would be _lovely_ (Virgil’s eyes widened at the emphasis on the word “lovely” Oh god he knows) and if you don’t I will make you share a plate!”

“Patton this is ridiculous.”

“I don’t know the meaning of that word!” and the rest of the dinner carried on like this.

Patton’s attempts at “helping” Virgil get somewhere with his crush were all a bit like this. It really was quite astounding that Roman didn’t catch on that Patton was trying to hook the two of them up.

When they sat on the couch Patton kept rearranging them so he would get Roman sitting next to Virgil. He would rearrange their chores so they were together e.g. one washes dishes, one dries them. He would try and get them to do activities together “Here Roman have this coupon to go rock climbing – it will be an adventure and take Virgil with you.” “Um I don’t know if Virgil would enjoy that-” “Don’t be silly it’s a two for one coupon you have to take Virgil with you.” “Why can’t you and me just go.” “Roman – you are _this_ close to being grounded.” “Huh?”

Now at this point in the story I have to point out that in the Sanders household every year there seems to be an unspoken agreement between Roman, Patton and Thomas to delay taking down the Christmas decorations for as long as possible, even though this drives Logic somewhat insane. Every year when the Logical side tries to get them to start packing up, they to the best of their abilities try and procrastinate or flat out ignore Logan. Well until – you know, Logan flips his lid and starts screaming that it is January or February or March or whatever month they have made it to and they have to stop being lazy and pack up the Christmas decorations and no they cannot pretend that they are normal household ornaments that can be left up indefinitely, there is a huge difference between a regular household fern and a Christmas tree.

The point of telling you this is, Anxiety had been pinning over Princey for weeks and now that the sides had to pack up the Christmas decorations, Patton had discovered a way to move this crush forward – the mistletoe! Patton decided he was going to get Roman and Virgil to kiss under the mistletoe.

The morning they had set aside for packing up, Patton managed to drag Virgil off to the side while Roman and Logan were bringing in the empty boxes to store everything back in.

“Okay kiddo, when we are nearly finished packing up, go and stand under the hallway and say, “I’m too short to reach this I need some help” and then Roman will come over and you two kiss.”

Virgil spluttered “I -wha-huh?” he looked over to the hallway and saw the mistletoe hanging there and turned bright red. “Oh god Patton – no! I-I c-cant. N-no way.”

“Oh, come on kiddo, I know you fancy Roman.” smirked Patton gently elbowing Anxiety in the ribs.

Anxiety’s mouth opened and closed like a gaping fish, he suspected Patton knew but they had never talked about it- he couldn’t do this, he was Anxiety – nobody would ever want him like that, especially not Roman – who was gorgeous and a Prince.

“Patton, Roman… Roman would never be interested in me, he could have anybody, I-I not good enough-”

Patton cut him off by punching him sharply in the shoulder “You are good enough. You are better than good enough. You are great. You are amazing Virgil. And I wouldn’t be doing this if I honestly thought you were going to get shot down. I wouldn’t do that to you. But Roman needs to know that you like-like him, you know more than a friend, I know you aren’t comfortable with grand gestures and the great thing about mistletoe is, once you two stand there you have to kiss because it’s the law of nature or something, so you can let him be the one to do it.  And then-” but Patton couldn’t finish what he was saying because the others walked back in and Virgil quickly squeaked and shushed him so the others wouldn’t hear what they were talking about.

Virgil tried to pretend that conversation didn’t happen as they got to work packing up everything, but Patton kept giving him pointed looks. Roman and Logan didn’t seem to notice them. Logan was getting frustrated again with everyone because you can’t just throw everything into random boxes, there was a system and you had to place things neatly in the correct boxes or else things got tangled or went missing or the boxes became too full to close properly.

When they were nearly done Patton was helping Virgil close up one of the boxes when he elbowed him and glared pointedly at the hallway mistletoe. Virgil got the Dad stare full force.  Shakily he walked over to the little plant hanging from the ceiling.

“Um I-I-I short um and-and” stuttered Virgil, thinking was it too late to run? But he had been speaking so softly that no one apart from Patton who was watching him heard him.

Patton cleared his throat “Ahem, Virgil needs some help over there he can’t reach that decoration.”

“Really are you sure, I put it up and I didn’t even need to stand on tip toe.” said Logan who started walking over to Virgil.

Virgil’s eyes widened in alarm, as Patton realizing that his fantastic plan was about to be ruined if Logan went over instead of Roman did the only sensible thing imaginable and crashed tackled Logan at the knees making him fall to the ground.

“Ow Patton what on Earth are you doing?” cried Logan.

Patton gripped Logan’s trapped legs tighter, “Stop it can’t be you. Don’t ruin everything. I won’t let you be taken by the laws of nature.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Logan struggling to break out of Patton’s grip.

“Stop fighting me Logan, quickly Roman go and help Virgil take down that decoration. Hurry!”

Roman who had edged nervously away from Patton after he had tackled Logan looked over and realized what the decoration Patton was talking about was. He gasped and clapped his hands over his mouth as he saw how nervous and red Virgil was as he was standing under it. Did-did this mean that Virgil _wanted_ Princey to stand under it too? Of course! Virgil must be too shy to ask that’s why he got Patton to ask Roman to go over for him. Oh, this was so romantic.

Virgil turned an even deeper scarlet as he saw Roman’s face fill with understanding. Again, he thought about running for it but he didn’t think his legs could carry him.

Oh god, oh god, oh god.  Roman’s walking over to him.

He’s standing next to me. He’s looking up at the mistletoe.

“So, um Virgil – just in case you didn’t notice we’re both standing under the mistletoe.”

Virgil swallowed nervously. Okay so maybe running was too hard right about now, but what if he dropped to the floor and started crawling away?

“And you know – if two people stand under mistletoe – well they’re supposed-”

Roman leaned in closer, just slightly. Poor Virgil was trembling from head to foot.

“-to kiss.” Roman whispered softly.

Virgil couldn’t stop staring into those warm brown eyes.

“Do you mind if I kissed you Virgil? I don’t want to force a tradition on you.”

_*Incomprehensible soft squeaky noise*_

“…um… what was that?”

“Y-y-yes.”

“Good.”

The kiss was soft, tender and gentle, and allowed Virgil to pull away if he wanted to (he didn’t) because Roman didn’t want to make the other more nervous than he already was by going in with a fiery passionate kiss (there would be time for that later). This kiss was their first (or so Roman thought) so it was important that this wasn’t some grand gesture because their love was not some sort of “gesture”, it may have occurred unexpectedly and with the last person either of them ever imagined but it was real and Roman wanted to make sure it would last forever.

When they pulled away, Patton who had pinned Logan to the floor and was sitting on top of him with his knees pressing into the other’s back applauded, bouncing up and down.

“Ow, Patton that hurts get off me!”


	22. The end...?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All good things must come to an end so I've decided to make this as a sort of final chapter/epilogue sort of thing. Maybe this fic could lead to more things in the future - who knows.

Logic didn't understand love. 

He didn't understand how it made people act pathetic or irrational. 

He didn't understand how it could turn people into a mess of giggles or make them start bawling their eyes out over the simplest of things. 

But most of all - he didn't understand how Virgil falling for Roman and Roman feeling the same way and them kissing under the mistletoe was considered a LEGITIMATE REASON TO EXCUSE THEM FROM FINISHING PACKING UP THE REST OF THE CHRISTMAS DECORATIONS! Why did Patton let them leave? Now it was just himself and Patton and Patton was terrible at packing up - have you seen his room?!? Love wasn't being fair. 

"Oh come on Logan, don't be so upset, we were nearly finished anyway."

"Hmph"

"And besides they were so happy, they needed a bit of time together."

"We all live in the same house, they could have found plenty of time later to be together." 

"Logan please try and turn that frown upside down. No one should be unhappy at Christmas."

"It is not Christmas! Christmas was weeks ago." 

"It really does feel longer doesn't it, so much has happened over the weeks leading up to it, it feels-it feels almost like its been nearly a year."

"Well I'll be glad when we can all settle down into our normal everyday uneventful lives again. Come on lets get these boxes back into storage." 

So Logan and Patton carefully carried the boxes to the cupboard under the stairs, Logan went inside of course - storing the boxes was a bit like Tetris, everything had to go in its correct spot or nothing would fit. And Patton would never go into that cupboard because he was terrified of spiders, so he just passed the boxes over to Logan.

Wistfully remembering all the wonderful things he loved about Christmas, Patton was off in his own little world. He jumped as he turned around to get the next box. Deceit was standing next to him - Patton hadn't seen him there. Deceit had opened one of the Christmas boxes and was holding Roman's new pink bauble that said: Roman <3 Family

Deceit had a small frown on his face as he read the message. 

"Hi Deceit!" said Patton cheerfully recovering from his fright. 

"Good afternoon Morality, it is always such a pleasure to see you." drawled Deceit. 

"Oh thank you, it's great to see you too. We're tidying up a bit. Did you want to help?"

"Certainly."

Patton beamed that was so nice of Deceit. But Deceit didn't move to pick up any of the boxes. Instead he asked "What's this?"

"That's a new decoration Roman got for Christmas, isn't it pretty. And he got all of us our own decorations with our names on them to put on the tree, I think they are one of the best presents I've ever gotten and I'm not just saying that because Roman let me open it early. Isn't it just the best? Isn't Christmas just the best?"

Deceit's frown became more pronounced when Patton said "got all of us" 

"Oh yes, I just love Christmas it is my favourite holiday. Oops." said Deceit as the pink decoration was no longer in his hand. 

Patton gasped as he watched the pretty pink bauble fall quickly down to the floor, but luckily it didn't break it just bounced on the floor. Patton was so relived as he quickly scooped it up. 

"Clumsy me." muttered Deceit as he walked away looking unhappy. 

"It's okay, everyone drops things sometimes." Patton called after him. 

"Patton! What are you doing? Where's the next box?" Logan called his voice muffled from inside the closet. 

"Sorry, here's the next one." replied Patton getting back on task, although he was a bit confused as to why Deceit left when he said wanted to help - maybe the other side just suddenly remembered something important he had to do. 

But all thoughts of Deceit were banished from his mind when he had a wonderful thought that he just had to ask Logan about. 

"Logan. LOGAN!"

"What?"

"Logan, can we, can we pretty please have a Christmas in July this year?"

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay - first and foremost - thank you everyone who read this fic and was so patient with my extremely inconsistent updates.  
> I really hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it. 
> 
> I plan for this to be the last chapter, when I started this Deceipt didn't exist and when he came into being I wondered if I should try and fit him into the story or not, this leaves things a bit open if I want to do another story with a bit more of a focus on him. 
> 
> I really hope my other stories don't take as long to finish. Comments give my life meaning so please feel free to leave a comment below about what you thought of this story.


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